art-by-pla.com

Carving fruits and vegetables is distinctly Thai. It has been a part of our culinary culture for centuries and it’s something that I love to do. The food doesn’t even have to taste that good, but when it is presented with a bit of art, people immediately applaud.

A great site to learn more about fruit and vegetable carving is www.simply-thai.com. They talk about a lot of the traditional ways to carve, but I enjoy creating as I go.

Many people will think that carving fruit takes a ton of time, but that really is not the case. Don’t carve every single piece because then no one will be willing to eat it. Instead carve just a handful of decorative pieces and cut the rest as you would in any case.

Here I show how you can take an onion, which was an ingredient in the curry I was serving, and turn it into a flower. Sure, the first couple of times you attempt to do this it will take a while. But pretty soon, it’ll only add a couple of minutes to your preparation time and it’ll be a world of difference in your presentation.

Art can be anywhere. Even in an onion.

Yum.