Today I finished up the Faux Popcorn Balls I was working on. Frankly, they didn’t take long at all to make and I really like how they turned out. A lot of time, the making of faux food is very labor intensive.
So, I needed faux popcorn balls for a mini museum exhibit on old time Christmas. We have a small holiday tree we put up in the farmhouse’s parlor. Every year, we string three strands of faux popcorn through the branches. However, the farm family would have also made popcorn balls to hang on the tree.
At the mini museum, I’m thinking of adding these faux popcorn balls to the kitchen table with perhaps some popcorn in the heavy black kitchen skillet. The farmwife might be making popcorn balls and also stringing popcorn for the trimming the holiday tree at the same time. Often in our Christmas display, the farmwife is making holiday cookies with a vintage cookie cutter.
Directions
The first step in making faux popcorn balls is to gather together the craft supplies. I purchased the three Styrofoam balls in the craft store.
However, it was more difficult to find the right Styrofoam packing peanuts. A bag of these packing peanuts was given to me by a friend who had them in her house. This is a perfect fit for this project.
The Styrofoam Ball and packing peanuts is next to a bag of real popcorn. It helps to have the real food next to the faux food you are making to see how close you can get to it.
Next, hand tear up the packing material into small bits that look like the size of popped popcorn. Then using white household glue, paste the bits onto the Styrofoam balls.
It was helpful to glue a section at a time and allow that area to dry. I used small glass containers to hold the balls in position until the glue was dry.
Finishing the Faux Popcorn Balls
When the glue is totally dry, you are ready for the last step which is painting the popcorn balls with acrylic paints.
Initially, I thought I would be able to paint the white packing peanuts a pale shade of yellow white. But, when I started the painting, the packing peanuts began to “melt”. I stopped immediately.
In rethinking things, the packing peanut color is close enough to the color of popcorn, so no paint is needed.
Instead, I used yellow and brown acrylic paints to lightly paint some of the kernel parts of the popcorn. I used a smaller stiff brush for the painting.
I think they turned out pretty good but, of course, I did get a little bit of “melting”.
Remember with faux food, it is all about the illusion of real food. Not one is going to get too close to the popcorn balls to see that they are not real. They will look real from a distance.
These faux popcorn balls will be donated where they will add another element to museum kitchen setting. The good feelings of Christmas on the farm, speaks of not only faux popcorn balls but, also, of a good simple down on the farm celebration.