Pinter-Testing the Paleo Watermelon Cake

Pinterest's 'Everything' screenshot, May 9, 2013

 A MONTH or two ago I finally launched a Pinterest account. For those who do not know what Pinterest is, it's a website where everyone who is registered can assemble picture boards full of photos which link to or simply show recipes, weight loss tips, exercise regimens, survivalist equipment, loving photos of rifles and other firearms, professional posed baby photos, gardening advice, aggressive humour, cartoons, crafts and millions of wedding planning tips. It has been around since March 2010. In 2012 it had some 11.7 million registered users.* Amongst others, the wives of the two candidates in the last U.S. presidential elections, magazines like Martha Stewart Living, and museums from the Prado in Madrid to the Museum of Cinema in Texas run Pinterest accounts.

* "Pinterest" [Wikipedia]

Looking at Pinterest from a serious critical perspective there is a lot that is neither entertaining nor very healthy ('thinspo' in which young girls are encouraged to become thin enough to develop a gap between their thighs, the obsession with weddings, racist 'jokes,' and supposed medical advice which is not reputably sourced, etc.).

It is a climate of haphazard fact-checking. A harmless example: Some 'pins' which often reappear on Pinterest due to popularity are inspiration quotes which are misattributed to arbitrary dead celebrities. For instance, 'Oscar Wilde' : "You don't love someone for their looks, or their clothes, or their fancy car, but because they sing a song only you can hear."

TO REMEDY this empirical Wild West in a small way, I have decided to try out, research and — if necessary — debunk an assortment of Pins. There are many tempting notions, e.g. 'Exercises to increase drainage of lymphatic fluid and get perky boobs,' but let's begin with Paleo recipes.

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THE 'PIN'

The Paleo Watermelon Cake derives its name from the 'Paleo diet,' which attempts to reestablish the food spectrum common in what used to be called the Stone Age. This time period covers some 2.6 million to 10,000 years ago,* before the advent of broadscale agriculture.

* "Paleolithic" [Wikipedia]

THE OVERVIEW

THE RECIPE I found — through Pinterest — is from the website Paleo Cupboard. The cake's ingredients are a watermelon, coconut milk, vanilla extract, honey, seasonal fruit, and almonds. It asks you to carve the rind off a watermelon so that you have a cylinder, to coat it in coconut whipping cream, and to decorate it with almonds around the sides and with berries or kiwis or other fruit above. So there is no baking involved, and indeed sugar and flour are anathema to the Paleo diet.