Cute food: puppy pears

Here's a cute food idea that's guaranteed to make kids smile: transform pear slices into puppy dog faces with a drizzle of chocolate. Perfect for kids that eat with their eyes, or it's an easy way to brighten up a ho-hum day.

Level of difficulty:

Not too tricky, but a steady hand is needed to slice the pears.

To make puppy pears you'll need:

• Pears,
• a sharp knife,
• 25g / 0.8oz melted dark chocolate (this will be plenty to do 1–2 pears),
• piping bag.

Puppy pears - what to do:

1. Cut up a whole pear into slices about 0.5cm / 0.2" thick. Keep the scrappy end bits, too, as these make great puppy ears.

2. To stop pear slices from going brown, give them a soak in salt solution at this point (see below), if you wish.

3. Place onto a tray. Pipe details onto each face—dots or little curves for the eyes, a big nose, a smile and some whisker spots. Put a little pear end scrap onto each face to make an ear (or draw an ear on with chocolate). If you make a mistake and decide to do your face again, no worries! Just let the chocolate harden and use a butter knife to gently scrape it off. 

4. Delicious eaten as they are, but for extra puppy points, try dipping them in some peanut butter!

To make the salt solution:

Make a salt solution to soak the pears with to stop them from discolouring. 

1. Dissolve 1 tsp of salt in a little bit of boiling water, then add 500ml / 17 fl oz of cold water. 
2. Once you’ve finished cutting fruit into their desired shapes, pop them in the solution for around 10 minutes.
3. When you’re ready to use them, rinse under fresh water to get rid of any salty taste, then place them on a clean tea towel to dry. 

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Cute food pear recipe, styling + photography by Rachel Savage for Lunch Lady Magazine Issue 27.