Hi everyone,
Didn’t your heart just sink last night when
that macaron tower was presented to last night’s MasterChef Australia
contestants? I am seriously considering cancelling my tapas plans at Bistro
1682 tonight, so that I can stay home and watch the end result of that
challenge in real time. (Thank God for my PVR!)
I have long despised the macaron. I know
it’s ridiculous to take against a piece of confectionary, but sadly, it’s true.
There’s just something so mean about macarons, in my experience.
Form is so often sacrificed for taste… so these tempting plates of vibrantly
coloured beauty tend to end in a sad mouthful of dry powder. It’s almost as if
they grace the tea table as a rebuke: “Aren’t we beautiful? Just don’t touch
now.”
I know, I know. This was all before I
actually tasted a GOOD macaron, which is a ridiculously rare mouthful of
marvellousness. But by then it was too late. I had chosen sides… and sidled
up to the cupcake. Vote here for your favourite.
The cupcake, by its very nature, is a thing
of comfort and friendliness. It’s hard to screw up, but satisfyingly tricky to
conquer. It’s appealing to both old and young, and can happily accommodate all
manner of experimentation – from savoury to sweet, and a range of interesting
stops in between.
Which is why I so thoroughly enjoyed the
Blogger Cupcake Competition we’ve been running on Food24, and why I was so
excited by the flood of entries – everything from the breathtaking to the
disturbing. Caro chose her top five, which you – the readers – then narrowed
down to three winners. My heartfelt congratulations to Alida Ryder, Nina Timm and Terry Cohen.
So
what’s next?
In fact, we had so much fun… we’re launching a hamburger competition this
week. Yup, send in your top recipes for perfect patties and fantasmagorical
toppings, which transform the humble hamburger into a thing of true culinary
fabulousness. There’s R1750 to be won!
I am having way too much fun here. Can you
tell? (Oh… and don’t get me STARTED on petit fours. Actually, distract me
from them, but sharing your ridiculous
food prejudices or anthropomorphisms.) <link to the blog>
Love &
happy food,