A friend forwarded me the photo of the insanely intricate watermelon lanterns above. The photos served as a humbling reminder that no matter how great I think I am at carving watermelon, there are people out there who are much, much better.
The lanterns were carved by the chefs at a Chinese restaurant in Toronto, Canada as part of the city’s annual Rogers Chinese Lantern Festival (or it used to be annual – I don’t think they do it anymore). It takes about an hour to carve each lantern, which is incredibly fast considering it takes me longer than that to carve a simple watermelon hedgehog.
What’s also amazing is that the lid, base, and body of the watermelon lantern are all interconnected by something resembling a series of watermelon chain links. I have no idea how the chef did that, but it’s truly incredible, don’t you think?