How to Cut & Carve a Decorative Cantaloupe

If you're hosting a summer get-together or picnic, transform a cantaloupe into table decor and serving bowls. Transform the cantaloupe into decorative artwork using a knife and a little creativity. Fill the two halves with fresh fruit so that your cantaloupe creativity can serve as edible art. Pick cantaloupes at the peak of their ripeness for the best-tasting and looking fruit.

• 1

  Hold a whole cantaloupe under running tap water and scrub the rind with a produce brush to remove any bacteria or dirt. Pat the fruit dry with a paper towel or cloth. Set the cantaloupe on a clean cutting board.

• 2

  Draw a zigzag pattern across the middle of the cantaloupe rind using a nontoxic marker as a template for the decorative cuts.

• 3

  Use a long, sharp carving knife to cut along the zigzag pattern on the cantaloupe rind. Make deep cuts to pierce the center of the melon.

• 4

  Separate the melon by gently pulling the halves apart along the cut line. Spoon out the seeds.

• 5

  Scoop out the fruit, using a melon baller. Set the melon balls aside.

• 6

  Create a fruit salad using the cantaloupe balls, watermelon balls, green and purple grapes and sliced strawberries. Place the fruit salad in the hollowed-out cantaloupe rinds. Make one fruit salad-filled cantaloupe bowl for each guest.