Luau Fruit Display

One of my very good friends is getting married this fall and we celebrated her wedding shower today with a Luau!  One of my bridesmaid duties was to create a fruit display for her and I was so excited that she asked me to do it!

She sent me two photos (a palm tree platter and a pineapple tree with monkeys) that she really liked to give me some inspiration and set me loose to create something.  This was by far my favorite fruit adventure yet.  I loved this display more than anything I have done in the past, even more than the Sesame Street fruit and veggie trays that I made in February for our son's birthday party.

This is the entire display which included a pineapple tree with a bride and groom monkey and "coconuts" (kiwi), fruit bowls made from the rinds of a watermelon, two pineapples (one cut vertically, one cut horizontally), and two honeydew melons.  I added whole bunches of bananas, green and purple grapes and strawberries to decorate around the fruit bowls, a palm tree platter, banana dolphins eating grapes and a bowl of fruit salad.

Pineapple tree and monkeys.  The fruit needed to make this exact display is 4 pineapples, 2 mangoes, 2 oranges, 1 lemon, 1 tangerine, 2 grapes, 1 bunch of miniature bananas, and kiwis.  I used wooden bamboo skewers and toothpicks to assemble.  The most important part of this display is your base/dowel rods.  This is a VERY heavy tree and the monkeys add weight as well.  You need a sturdy and heavy base and a sturdy rod (or two).

The pineapple parrots were my favorite part of the display and they couldn't have been easier to make.  The watermelon bowl is filled with chunks of fresh pineapple and some bing cherries.

I also loved how this little bowl looked.  Once I started cutting up fruit for my fruit salad I couldn't stand to just compost all of the "skins" of the fruit.  This gave me inspiration to use them as bowls to hold my fruit.  This pineapple was cut vertically (you need a very sharp knife) and I added a orange peel flower.

Honeydew melon was filled with cherries and you get a glimpse of the banana dolphins in the background.

Close-up of the banana dolphins.

Using fruit is a wonderful way to bring life to your food table, add to your theme decorations and make eating healthy foods even more fun for your guests.

Enjoy!!