How to Make a Fruit Platter

way back when I used to work the garden Monet station at a country club early in my professional career we would make the most beautiful fruit displays we'd showcase them for weddings holidays big barbecues I absolutely love to do it I'm going to show you how to make a show stopper for your next get-together using three easy tips that you can definitely do sound good let's food Style now for my first tip and probably the most crucial one to ensuring you have a successful fruit tray is making a beautiful centerpiece I mean this is going to be the focal point on the entire fruit platter so it has to be gorgeous now you can do a myriad of different fruits whether it's honeydew or cantaloupe or pineapple I'm going to use watermelon it's big and has very vibrant colors with the pink and the green and when it comes to using a watermelon you have to make sure it is ripe and in season and while there are a bunch of different schools of thought on what makes a perfectly ripe watermelon I'm just going to say this whether it's perfectly round in shape and heavy or has some dark sun spots on it that will at least get you started to having a nice sweet watermelon everything other than that I haven't had a lot of success with so what I'm going to do is make a basket and then I'm going to use a little melon baller to put all that watermelon back in that basket it's going to be awesome here's how you do it you're going to need a pen or a Sharpie what we want to do is outline the basket handle so go over the top to the halfway point come over two inches and go over the top of the halfway point again and then connect the two lines right around the outside now I do want to say this does not have to be perfect in any way shape or form it's okay if the line is a little zigzagged then using a tornado knife or a paring knife just score along the Drawn Lines as best you can and you're not going deep at all this is to help start the cut to make it easier to slice through with a bigger knife and my wife calls me safety boy for a reason so I want to make sure you're being extra careful here see how it's rocking back and forth that's going to be a little dangerous when we're cutting into it so on this bottom part we're just going to smooth it out using a chef knife to flatten it so when we cut into it it doesn't move now to do this and in general carving all of our fruit you can use a chef knife a boning knife or a serrated knife just make sure all of them are very sharp after you slice off a little bit you can roll back over see nice and sturdy now take your knife and I'm going to use a chef knife because I'm most comfortable using it and we are going to gently press down where I've scored using that tornee knife now once I get to the bottom of where my lines are I'm not going to go all the way down and try to connect it if you ever cut through a watermelon and it splits I want to be careful so I'm going to take it out in chunks I'm going to go down just a couple inches from where I sliced before and take out one inch thick slices until I get that perfectly formed basket that I'm looking for now do the same thing on the other side be careful when doing this take chunks out of the side until you get it to where you want it then I'm going to use a torn a knife just to come in there and carve out the handle now you can also use the chef knife but I prefer a smaller knife for accuracy then slice through it at the bottom and then pull that little chunk out now you've got a nice little handle feel free to clean it up using that tornee knife as well so what happens if you accidentally cut through the basket top well to be honest with you it has absolutely happened to me so don't stress out just use some toothpicks put it in the top basket part and push it right down into the bottom part you'll be fine the whole goal is to make this beautiful no one is going to know now all right I want to scoop some melon balls out of here I love this little melon ball these are just great to have just makes things a little bit more beautiful lets people know you put the extra touch on things I think people appreciate that this is an Oxo brand I think I picked it up for like seven bucks on Amazon I'll drop a link for you but all we do is get in there and scoop and we're good you'll probably get about 80 to 90 watermelon balls in total just press down and turn the scooper boom you're good once you get down to that first layer and you can't make any other Scoops just take a spoon and carve down until it's flat again repeat the process until you get all the way down to the bottom of the watermelon now there are going to be some chunks of that watermelon that we cut out like inside the basket handle that's great to use this melon baller again utilize as much as you can totally fine to use the thicker chunks that have the green rind on it as well all is good now for the bottom of it I'm just going to use that spoon and sort of carve it out to make it a little bit more rounder on the bottom this does not have to be perfect in any way just scrape it to make it look a little bit nicer and at this stage we're going to take some of those bigger chunks that we couldn't get melon balls out of and we're going to put them at the bottom they're still edible pieces this is going to help make our basket look very plentiful and full of the melon ball watermelon that we already took out of it see a nice overflowing watermelon basket absolutely beautiful also another option if you want to add color or make it even Fuller is use the melon baller on some of the cantaloupe honeydew or pineapple and until the entire fruit platter is finished you can just cover that watermelon basket and plastic wrap just keep it in the refrigerator now there is still going to be quite a bit of watermelon left over that didn't quite fit that melon ball mold what can you do with that I've got an awesome recipe on my website for agua fresca check it out I think you'll dig it it's a great way to utilize it all right for my second tip color what is more beautiful than a gigantic fruit spread that is loaded with different colors and that really comes in the form of tropical fruit so pineapples honeydews cantaloupes those things are exactly what I'm going to use so I'm going to start with honeydew melon now this has a green flesh in the interior now to ensure that you're picking out a ripe one you will see some spider webbing on some of those that indicate some ripeness what I was always taught was on the bottom end here okay if you push in and it's a little bit soft not too firm that lets me know I'm good to go so how do we prepare it we just start by slicing off each end slice the end off and then give it a quick flip slice the other end off the main reason we do this is so that it's not rocking back and forth you got a nice sturdy bottom there then using the chef knife what we're going to do is carve down on the Rind exposing the flesh you're maybe going in like an eighth of an inch Max then turn it and you can see where the flesh meets the Rind use that as a guide while constantly turning the honeydew melon until it's completely carved now what I like to do with this stage is go back see if there's any skin or rind anywhere any big white pieces and just carve those off perfect now slice the honeydew melon in half lengthwise and use a very large spoon what we want to do is just get rid of the seeds now you can puree this up and maybe make a quick drink out of it I don't know I don't do that I just discard it if you're one of those folks who just likes to utilize everything you can try that now at this stage we're going to slice it in half one more time turn it and then slice it into roughly half inch thick slices all the way down now here's the main reason we do this because when we're going to Plate it up we're going to Fan it out it's going to look absolutely beautiful just like this now for the cantaloupe the exact same process those nice sunspots those nice soft push in points on the core end exactly what we want for a nice ripe cantaloupe we repeat the process slicing off the ends carving it to remove any green from the cantaloupe and skin of course I'm going to slice it in half and remove the seeds now for another option to slice it slice it in half lengthwise again and then turn it then slice it in those half inch thick slices doing this while it's put together helps keep it balanced upright all right comey's last of the big tropical fruits here pineapple very similar to the cantaloupe and honeydew to tell if it's in season and ripe by pushing on the bottom making sure it's soft but still firm another way checking out the pineapple fronds now if you can gently tug away and they pull out you're in good shape now here's how we prepare it we want to repeat pretty much the same process as the cantaloupe and honeydew by slicing off both ends of the pineapple especially that end with all the fronds on there now I want to carve along the outside you'll see those little holes there they're known as eyes very similar to potatoes we want to slice those out as well because they can be a little bit bitter and chewy so once you've sliced the outside go back and clean it up make sure there are no eyes anywhere once it's cleaned up you see that core in the center we are going to slice the pineapple in half then what we want to do is Lay It Down flat and slice it in half Again by doing this you're going to expose the core and it's going to be easier to remove so just take your knife at about a 45 degree angle and slice off the core then we turn it and slice it in the exact same manner as the can open pineapple nice half inch thick uniform slices for the top of the pineapple you could actually use this as a centerpiece to your fruit display if you'd like as well and now it's time to start putting everything on our platter I've got a nice big oversized tray here you can use something like this or even smaller use what you have but once we plate everything up we'll be able to see where our gaps are which will lead us into tip number three so the first thing we're going to do is put our watermelon basket right in the center carefully grab your watermelon basket from the bottom do not pick it up by the handle then I'm going to start with the cantaloupe I'm going to Fan it out on one side then I'm going to repeat the process directly on the other side again making almost a tee with it should look like this doing the same thing with the Honey Dew melon making a sort of uniform t-shape around the watermelon again pineapple exact same feature and for my third and final tip garnishes and fillers but I'm going to use those in the same sense because there are some gaps that need to be filled but for those I'm going to garnish with berries also another great thing to do is use fruit that maybe people don't often use like dragon fruit or I've got some regular kiwis and some golden kiwis for the mint I'll show you how to do that at the end but when it comes to berries if you're not using them on the day that you purchase them what I was always taught is to put them in single layers in an airtight container and then really keep them on paper towels and stack them up maybe just two or three High when they're in those little containers things are jam-packed in there and squishing and that's why they go bad so quickly so airtight containers all right let's fill in those gaps this part is up to you but I'm going to start by doing blueberries on one side and then blueberries on the exact opposite side as well then with the raspberries the same exact process now we obviously have a lot less berries than those big melon fruits so we're only going to be able to do it on two sides then how about strawberries these are great I like to leave the green ends on there as well for a hint of color makes it look really pretty then of course blackberries add those to the board as well now the goal here is to fill it in so you really don't see the bottom part of the platter makes a nice plentiful board how about some kiwi as well slice off the ends and then carve off the skin if you've never prepared it this way thinly slice it I'm going to add it right to that board to fill in another Gap and I'm like 97 of the way finished with the fruit platter but if you think about what got us to this stage it's still fundamental basic techniques and that includes knife cuts when you do Precision knife cuts it just lets people know you put that extra time and carry into things and in return what happens it's just better it's just more delicious I don't know why it just is and really to finish this off all I'm going to do is add some of the different berries on top in that watermelon basket like blackberries raspberries blueberries all those things and then last but not least for the mint like I was telling you we're gonna save for the last part all we do is put some of those leaves in with the watermelon in the basket in cooking green represents freshness so when we do this it gives a pop of green lets everyone know that this is Super Fresh a stunning fruit platter a show stopper and I'm telling you you can do this it can look identical to this I promise you that and if you like this you're gonna love my charcuterie board recipe I've got an awesome video if you can see on there thank you

Channel: Chef Billy Parisi

Views: 10,411

Keywords: asmr fruit platter, chef billy parisi, christmas fruit platter, easy fruit platter, fruit decoration, fruit platter arrangement, fruit platter asmr, fruit platter cutting, fruit platter decoration, fruit platter designs, fruit platter ideas, fruit platter ideas for birthday party, fruit platter ideas simple, fruit platter tips, fruit platters, healthy fruit platters, how to arrange a fruit platter, how to make a fruit platter, simple fruit platter ideas

Id: VW4pgZRVT7g

Length: 13min 18sec (798 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 28 2023