April Fools Day Food isn't just what you use to fill your gullet on April 1st, but can also be an important part of your April Fools trickery. But you don't need to go to a trick grocery store to find it, but rather any regular supermarket; instead, the fun comes with how you present the food to your marks.

April Fools Day offers a wealth of opportunities to have a good harmless laugh at someone else's expense. Usually this means finding the most gullible person you know, and seeing if he'll believe a whopper: you're actually a CIA agent and he's in danger, Lebron James is retiring from the NBA to enter the priesthood, et cetera. But another way to partake in the festivities, while also entertaining some of your closest friends and family, is to build your April Fool's pranks around a meal. You can dye a food a special color (say, purple beer) and pass it off as another (in this case, grape juice), screw up the order of the meal (such as, salad for dessert), or build an elaborate lie around each course (this dish came from my aunt, whom you probably know as Julia Child). Whatever you decide on, April Fools Day food is an inexpensive way to make a little fun in the spring.

• Colored Milk: Buy milk in a half-gallon cardboard container so the milk can't be seen, then add bright food coloring and mix well.

• Mixed-up Meal: Serve a meal in reverse order, with the dessert first, then the main dish, and finish with a salad or appetizer.

• Dish Disaster: Serve food items in different dishes to confuse diners. For example, place mashed potatoes in a glass and a beverage in a bowl.

• De-liquified Lemonade: Make lemon-flavored gelatin according to the package directions. Pour the mixture into glasses, then place a straw in each glass. When the "lemonade" has set, serve to unsuspecting guests.

• Surprise Meal: Disguise foods as something else. Decorate a chocolate cake to look like a meatloaf, or make cupcakes out of hamburger and ice it with mashed potatoes.

• Ingredient Switch: That's not a lump of butter on top of the filet mignon, but a small scoop of butterscotch ice cream. But don't tell the diners until they start to look around with confusion as they dig into the first bite.