Apple Creatures (Make Your Own)

This fun series is for home cooks that are eager to advance their food presentation skills, for parents that would like to work with their children to create fun food creatures (and are handy with a knife), and for professional food stylists and chefs.

Titles in the Make Your Own series:

Apple Creatures
Carrot Creatures
Pepper Creatures
Tomato Creatures

The variety of creatures offers many choices for their use, from a sophisticated fruit or vegetable salad, to a tray of hors d'oeuvres, or a children's party.

There are no special skills or experience required, and the only tool is a small sharp paring knife that is easy to handle. The instructions are clear and step by step photographs show every single cut to make and how to assemble the pieces. And of course, there is a feature photograph of the finished creature.

Each book shows how to make about 50 plants, flowers, animals, people and objects. For example, sheep, monkey, dog, dragon, elephant, clown, spider, cowboy, pirate, frog, fish, tyrannosaur, pineapple, cow, tiger, crocodile, boy, rose, daffodil, truck, robot, owl, and centipede.

These how-to books are so engaging and clearly photographed that an adult and child could have fun together just flipping the pages to watch the creatures come to life. Are those the hands? Is that the hair? The tail? A fun and practical selection that also makes a great gift.

Iryna Stepanova obtained a university degree in Ukraine, where she was born. Sergiy Kabachenko was born in Belarus and has a degree in engineering. Together they have published over 130 books since 2004, with more than 1.5 million copies in 26 languages.