Every Veterans Day our country comes together to honor and celebrate our courageous military veterans. Without these heroes, we would not have the privilege of freedom that we too often take for granted.
This weekend, when you are at your town’s Veterans Day parade and celebrations, a unique gift to hand out would be a fruit knife engraved with “Thank You, Veterans.” It’s a small but thoughtful gesture for our country’s heroes.
June is national fruit and vegetable month. What a great time to show your talents with a fruit knife. You can make edible decorations like these with a simple folding knife
that you probably already own. Maybe these ideas will lead to more ideas of your own. If you happen to make a mistake, you can easily make it disappear. Save only the best masterpieces for display at the barbecue table this spring. With a little bit of practice, you will be amazed at what you can do with a bowl of fruit and a fruit knife.
The original folding fruit knife was made of silver and mother-of-pearl in the late
1700’s in England. Why those materials? Silver is relatively soft, but it is resistant to the citric acid that would eat away at steel. Also, silver has anti-microbial qualities, which would tend to keep the knife free from harmful growths of bacteria. Mother-of-pearl is also impervious to citric acid, and it adds to the beauty of the knife. The less expensive fruit knives had celluloid handles, which would also be resistant to the acid content of fruits.
Today, most fruit knives are made of stainless steel. Sometimes plastic handles are used, to make the knife handle last longer.
In America, the fruit knife became popular in the 1930’s. Many companies would have their logo imprinted on the plastic handles in their corporate colors. They would give these as advertising products to their customers. Many are found in the possession of knife collectors today.
PURPOSE:
These specialty knives are made with very long skinny spear blades. Some blades are serrated. They are used by fruit and meat inspectors to get a sample from deep inside the product. The inspectors can then examine the smell, texture, and color of the product.
Credits: Some of this information is from the book Advertising Cutlery, Richard D. White, 1999.
How do you plan on celebrating Valentine’s Day this year with your loved one? Will you give them a thoughtful gift or make them a homemade dinner?
I bet they would be even more impressed if you show off these fruit knife tricks.
Which one will you try to master?
Have you ever purchased fruit from the grocery store, only to come home, slice it up, and realize it just wasn’t as ripe as you had hoped?
Enter the fruit knife.
Before cutting up all of the fruit you might be baking with for Thanksgiving, have a quick taste-test by taking a small segment out with your fruit knife. If it’s not quite ready, leave it out to ripen for a few more days and it’ll be ready for whatever delish pie you’re going to make next week!
Happy Holidays!
As the end of summer approaches, many bakers are looking to snag up the last of the ripe summer fruits to make pies, tarts, jams, sorbets, and many more yummy treats.
Peaches are one of this season’s prize fruits- they’re so juicy and sweet, which makes today (it’s Peach Pie Day!) a great day to bake with them.
What you’ll need for your peach pie:
Mix the above ingredients together, place in your crust, and bake! Enjoy!
Make this Christmas festive-looking simply by using a fruit knife to carve and slice up oranges, apples, mangos, watermelons…..you name it. Don’t worry about making a mistake. You can eat your mistakes!
Here are some tricks anyone can do with fruit knives. You don’t need much experience in carving to get some interesting results. Just get a mango, orange, and an apple, and a fruit knife, and try to copy these gorgeous pictures.
