How to make a snowflake

It’s been quite warm in NYC this winter (we only got some flurries a week ago or so) but despite the warm winter and bad economy, you still can feel festivity in the air! So, I’m going to do something wintery today.

There are so many food artists out there who can carve intricate amazing looking sculptures out of vegetable or fruit, but it takes a lot of practice to do what they do. So I want to share something that’s pretty easy and anyone can do. No special sharp knife is required to make this one either!

[Snowflake]
– radish (or apple or cheese. You can use carrot if you want red snowflakes.)
— straw
— round object (bottle cap, cookie cutter, etc…)

1. Slice radish

2. Use a round object (a bottle cap, the back of a cookie cutter, etc…) to cut out the radish

3. Make a hole in the center using a straw, and make a holes on 12, 3, 6, 9 o’clock positions of the radish.

4. Make a hole between the holes you just made.

5. Make a V incision around the outside of the radish, between each circle.

6. Cut out a tiny piece from the circles.

Not as elaborate as those fancy snowflake cookie cutters they sell at the store, but this one can easily fit inside the bento, and you make it into any size you want.

The one from this how-to is on the right side. I used a 6-petal cookie cutter for the one on the top left, and I made a bigger circle and put more holes on the one at the bottom left.

Not necessarily a tip, but things I realized while making this bento…
– I used radish for mine, but radish might be a bit bitter for kids. You can microwave radish a little bit to remove the bitterness.
– Cheese is really easily ripped apart. So after #2, I suggest you put the cheese on something like seaweed, ham, sliced vegetable or fruit, and continue.

You can see the pictures of “how to make a snowflake” on my flickr page.