Marshmallow Pumpkin Patch Incident.
After this post, I promise not to make weird things out of Halloween food for at least a few days. I know I’ve been doing it too much. It’s not like such features are turning me into an Internet superstar, so I must assume that there’s some deeply buried psychological need at play.
The first step is admission. The second step is to write about something else. As of this moment, I’m only ready to take the first step. So, here’s a really gross thing I made from brownies, pumpkin marshmallows and green-dyed coconut shavings.
Say hi to Bowl. Bowl plays host to brownie mix, oil, water, an egg and a bunch of crushed Halloween Oreos. Looked at from just the right angle, Bowl is an organic Death Star. The very definition of a “happy accident.”
It all started when I found this year’s bag of Kraft Jumbo Pumpkin Mallows. I already reviewed them last year, but they’re enormous, roughly pumpkin-shaped, and roughly pumpkin-colored. Scanning the package for anything that would justify the continued business of an idiot blogger who’d already covered the things in a complete and total way, I found Lady Luck on the back of the bag.
Lady Luck knows many forms, and this time, she manifested as a screwball recipe for “Pumpkin Pizza.”
Clearly, all other ambitions would slow to a crawl until I made Pumpkin Pizza.
So, I set out to do that. It wasn’t easy, since I don’t own a pizza pan. I mean, I know that we used to own one, but I couldn’t find the damn thing. Instead, I opted to go with a more traditional “brownie loaf,” decorated like a pumpkin patch. That seemed to be the key point of the recipe, anyway.
Really, they had me at “green coconut shavings.” Everything else felt negotiable.
When I completed my mission, I was utterly disappointed. It looked terrible!
I’m willing to accept exactly half of the blame, but the rest was all Kraft.
The main problem, admittedly, was my fault. I didn’t ice the brownie loaf. For some reason, it only occurs to me RIGHT NOW that I was supposed to. It’s not like I could’ve, anyway, since the brownie mix I used came with a big glob of Halloween edition orange icing. Not really suitable for a pumpkin patch, though in retrospect, probably a bit more suitable than naked brownie meat.
Even still, it’s kind of a wonky recipe. There isn’t much to it, and frankly, Kraft’s Jumbo Pumpkin Mallows don’t really look like pumpkins. They’re too pale in color, and they’re way too huge to make an edible pumpkin patch in the right scale. I stand firm that had I done everything correctly and followed the directions precisely, I’d still have ended up with a sucky patch.
For the sake of my soul, I need to believe that.
As things stood, this was not post-worthy at all. Let’s face it, that’s why I make these stupid things. I may enjoy creating them, but I’m really in it for the site content.
I was depressed and ready to throw in the towel, but I’d already invested several dollars and several hours into this. It couldn’t end here, so I went back to the drawing board and made some alterations. They say you can’t shine shit, but I was ready to die trying.
There, that’s a little better. The improvements in my *Official* Mallow Patch stemmed from losing the pretense that anyone was going to eat this thing. It didn’t need to look edible, and by the time I was done, it really no longer was edible. I’d turned brownies into pop art, and for a brief moment, the clouds parted.
Better photos:
Since the cat’s out of the bag, I won’t lie. I totally drew those mallow o’ lantern faces with a plain old black Sharpie. But discounting that and the action figures, it’s still mostly edible.
I tossed in some crushed almonds, hoping they’d add an earthy feel. They didn’t. It just made my pumpkin patch look like it’d been rained on by enormous nuts. Another happy accident.
As for my decision to line the pan’s edges with red icing, well, I had my reasons. One, it looked neat. Two, I burnt this shit to death, and there was absolutely no way to free my brownie loaf from its pan. If the pan had to be part of the presentation, then I was going to make it part of the presentation.
I don’t know why I threw E.T. into this. I don’t even remember putting him there. I don’t remember much about last night. After the Death Star batter, it’s all a blur.
So, was this worth the trouble?
Nah, it probably wasn’t. I went to the plate and took my best swing. Sometimes, you miss the ball. But at least I tried.
