Fruit Boxes (Boxes Made of 100% Rotten Fruit)

In this instructable I'll show you how to turn fruit into rock-hard shells. These shells could then be kept as a decoration or cut into two halves and used as a box. This is my favorite use of old fruit! It's kind of a secret my mother taught me, and I'm finally ready to share it with everyone :) One of the things I like about this project is that it is a zero-waste project. When I make stuff, I always have a tiny bit of guilt for using new materials and for making more waste. This is a guilt-free, zero-waste project, which is a huge plus for me!

Even though I'm posting this on the fruit & vegetables speed contest, this is far from being a quick project! It involves weeks (sometimes months!) of waiting for the fruit to rot. It's a zero-effort and zero-cost project, but it takes a lot of patience! (I started working on this instructable on January!!)

The steps are simple. Infect the fruit with the right fungus, wait for it to harden, and turn it into a box! I've only tried this method on lemons, oranges and my personal favorite - pomegranates! If you try any other fruit and it works, let me know!

If you have any questions, let me know! Hope you find this instructable useful!

Step 1: Infect You Fruit of Choice

The first step we must take is to infect the fruit with the right spores. Honestly, I just let a lemon or a small orange rot on a dry straw basket. More often than not, the lemon would be infected by these type of fungi (see first image) which turns its peel into a rock-hard brownish shell.

Once you have your first rotten fruit, you can infect others with the right spores when ever you want. Just roll them together! It works like magic (see images!)

Step 2: Wait for the Fruit to Dry

Let the infected fruit dry. I recommend using a basket of some sort. In the pictures above you can see an infected pomegranate drying.

Once the fruit is dry, you're basically done! You can turn it into a box like I did, or just put it for display - it looks like a wooden copy of the original fruit, and guests go crazy when they realize it's real!

Step 3: Turn Rotten Fruit Into Boxes

By now the fruit should be an empty shell. Using a wood saw, gently cut it in half.

I also glue a red piece of cloth using Elmer's glue just to make it fancy. And that's it! you're all done!

Hope you liked this instructable, and if you do, feel free to check out

the rest of my instructables in my instructables page!