Chew on This: The Exterior Obsession Theory
Why Fondant is a Reminder of Our Failing Society
“I’m worried my friends will think you’re fat.”
I blinked, and set down the phone, completely bewildered. We’d just started dating; the chemistry was sizzling.
Granted, I bake a lot, but I’m not fat. I know it. He knows it. But he’s worried his friends won’t know it.
After a swift breakup, I asked, what is wrong with this world? The answer stuck like frosting.
Fondant.
The Sticky Source
On the outside, fondant has a soft texture and can be formed into any shape or color. Cakes become immaculately smooth, ethereal, or almost alien.
It’s easy as Play-Doh: take it out of a package, knead it on a surface with cornstarch, and fondant away.
Fondant can:
- Cover cakes to create a smooth surface (or a textured surface)
- Provide stability for heavy decorations
- Form objects such as flowers, animals, shapes, etc.
Fondant actually increases the value of a wedding cake, by an extra dollar a slice or more. Bakers on the Food Network create six-foot edible creations, worth thousands of dollars. They may be 5% cake and 95% fondant but hey, at least they look good.
In Instagram time-lapse videos, we watch a cake being transformed into a car, a building, or a sofa. All “edible” of course.
Fondant is beautiful.
But it’s fake.
The Curtain (or Fondant) Falls
Pop it in your mouth, chew it a bit (or a lot), and the question will come quick: why is this $1000 cake covered in Play-Doh? It’s overly sweet, chewy as gum, leaves sugary grains on your teeth and an aftertaste of cardboard.
Fondant is a disgusting reminder of why our society is failing.
That could be a stretch. I could be clawing for a reason to explain my dating fails. But let’s illustrate this.
I was baking my first cake, the Sofa Cake. I assembled rich chocolate layers with silky cream cheese filling. I covered it in swirling, fluffy icing. Munching on the leftovers, the flavors thrilled me.
I opened a package of white fondant. I spent an hour trying to perfectly cover my sofa. There were tears, a panic attack, and maybe raised voices. My mother told me to give up; the cake already looked and tasted amazing.
But I had to get it perfect. It needed be Instagram-worthy.
Finally, I succeeded at covering the cake. I tasted a slice.
The fondant was nasty. I tried to peel it off, but it took all of my delicious icing with it. I had wasted an hour focusing on the least important part of the cake.
We bake a cake to eat it. Why do we stress about how others think it looks, when the reason it exists is to bring joy through its taste?
The Exterior Obsession
Our society is obsessed with exteriors. Exteriors of homes, cars, resorts, women, and men. Instagram is a awe-inspiring stage where actors fight to have a few seconds of light. Look behind the props; they’re only painted pieces of cardboard.
The obsession leaked to baking.
Some bakers describe their masterpieces, saying, “I used fondant, painted with edible gold and decorated with sugar flowers.”
What about the actual cake? Is chocolate? Red velvet? What’s the filling? Ganache? Italian buttercream? The focus is entirely on the exterior. The cake might as well be styrofoam.
What happened to simple, chocolate cakes with messy frosting? What happened to moist crumbs, nutty flavors, and creamy fillings?
Fondant is a form of artistic expression, but taken too far and the cake is a fancy chewy table-piece.
Stressing too much on appearance takes the fun out of baking. It undercuts the purpose of the cake: to celebrate a special occasion with family and friends and to enjoy a sweet treat.
It saddens me when someone worries more about what others think than an amazing relationship they’ve discovered. It also saddens me when bakers stress more about if others see their cake as pretty, rather than enjoying the baking process.
The Exterior Obsession is eating away our self-worth. What matters is who we are and how we carry out our own life’s mission.
If your life’s mission is to create fondant cakes, do it because you love it.
Don’t do it to cover “messy” frosting.
