 |
| Pinterest's 'Everything' screenshot, May 9, 2013 |
* "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.
***
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.
I looked at the very pretty illustration to the recipe and was fairly certain that it would not be easy.
Trialling the Whipping Cream
For instance, I bought an extra can of coconut cream and an extra can of coconut milk in advance since I wanted to test the whipping cream-making, and this turned out to be a wise step. It simply took me far longer than it takes to whip up an ordinary cow-derived cream. Even when I got around to the cake itself, I left out the honey and the vanilla extract so that the coconut cream would be very thick — it still tasted good. But following the recipe instructions exactly, with the full-fat coconut milk, turned out to be reasonably effective. Generally the problem is, though, that once one has spotted the translucent grey liquid which is no longer coconut cream, it is already too late and one has already begun to use stuff that is too watery to produce proper 'whipped' matter. A trick which is not mentioned in the recipe is to let the coconut milk foam stand for a minute or two every once in a while when you whip it; it coalesces better that way.
Shopping for the Ingredients
As it turns out from buying the groceries, the price was reasonably high. In a run-of-the-mill German grocery chain store, Edeka, the coconut milk, berries, and kiwis cost 11.84 €. In the Turkish grocery store which was carrying whole watermelons, my brother kindly purchased a fruit which — weighing 7.735 kg. — cost 16.94€. I had vanilla extract, honey, and almonds at home already. So the subtotal is 28.78 €.
[Obviously fruit prices change during the course of the year — I bought these on May 7th — and they depend on the country and zone in which one lives. Also, the watermelon might have been smaller.] Only three or four strawberries, maybe half the bilberries and one of the kiwis were on the cake, so the prices for these could be lowered to 28 cents for the strawberries, 1.24€ for the bilberries and 18 cents for the kiwi. But I also used raspberries, around the bottom of the cake, and these nearly all went in. Adjusting for these, the total is [ - (1.09-0.18, 1.79-0.28, 2.49-1.24 = 0.91, 1.51, 1.25 = 3.67) = 25.11€] — 25.11 €.
Making the Cake
The watermelon leached a lot of water, but I wicked it away with a paper towel from time to time, and of course I dried off the fruit so that the coconut whipping cream would stick better as the recipe suggested. Since I took a tall watermelon and used as much of the flesh as possible, it was a huge cake, which was nice but impractical since I needed more coconut whipping cream than I had. But the quantity of almonds worked, and so did the berries and kiwi on top. Pre-cutting the watermelon was not the best idea, since the tall slices toppled and I therefore poked chopsticks across two segments at a time to anchor them. It made for an interesting presentation, at least!
Tasting the Cake
Every one of the seven tasters, including me, liked the appearance of the cake and its flavour. The coconut went well with the other flavours, and it had a pleasing summery, tropical taste which elevated it from the species of healthy food which is as ascetic as it sounds. It was refreshing and filling, too, which was good on a warm day. (Refrigeration is important, as the recipe's author notes.)
THOUGHTS
The philosophical problem I have with the recipe is the idea that any person of the Paleolithic time would have been able to get his hands on almonds, watermelons, strawberries, kiwis, vanilla beans, etc. since these grow in different climates and have come from different corners of the Earth. Vanilla extract, being made with alcohol, is not strictly
***
Photo by me, of the cake, May 7, 2013. 'Shopped to brighten the photo and *cough* clean up a spot or two on the turquoise cloth.
***
SOURCES
"Paleo Watermelon Cake" [Paleo Cupboard] (c. April 13, 2013) [Read April 20, 2013]
"Paleo Recipes, Foods, Lean Meats, Fruits, Vegetables, Fish, Eat Healthy, Entrees, Snacks" [The Paleo Diet, via Internet Archive Wayback Machine] (January 11, 2008) [Read April 28, 2013]
No comments:
Post a Comment