Sunday, April 30, 2006

Marzipan Is Good

I am a sucker for grocery-store giveaways and free samples. If someone is offering chunks of papaya speared on toothpicks, or tiny slices of a freshly made hamburger on a cocktail napkin, or braised lamb and dill-adorned sweet potatoes in a little plastic cup (little plastic fork provided so you can eat it without getting your fingers dirty), then hey! I'm in line, and I might even ask for seconds if I think I'm likely to get them.

This past week, for whatever reason, my grocery store has been promoting and offering discounts on foodstuffs imported from Germany, including such exotica as herbal teas of both the chamomile and mint variety. I admit I passed on those products this time around--I like chamomile tea a lot and think mint is OK, but I'd already bought this German brand and found it weak and not special, so why buy it again?

As part of the German foods promotions, an affable middle-aged woman was offering slices of a marzipan pound cake. Marzipan, in case you don't know, is a mixture of ground almonds, confectioner's sugar, egg whites, vanilla, and that's about it. It's good. It can be molded into shapes and eaten on its own, or it can be an ingredient in other things, like pound cake. So this pound cake tasted like almonds.

And it was on sale and I'd eaten some of it for free, so I thought, what the hell, I'll buy a damn pound cake.

The affable woman pointed me to the display where more of these cakes were available to consumers like me. And under these cakes was a pile of more marzipan goodies, not mixed into cakes, just shaped into rolls and coated in chocolate.

And I thought, Hmm. Marzipan. It's been years since I've eaten or thought about marzipan, and maybe now it's time to go all out.

I bought the pound cake, but I also bought the chocolate coated marzipan roll. I didn't check the weight and I already tossed the wrapper, but based on the size and heft I'd guess it was the equivalent of two regular candy bars.

And I ate the whole thing in 24 hours. It was really yummy, and I wish I had another. There's still the pound cake, but it's got all those other ingredients, like flour and eggs and butter. I just want more ground-up almonds and sugar.

5 Comments:

Blogger Dale said...

Maybe if you flash your loveliest I Heart Marzipan smile and agree to appear in an ad, they'll set you up for life. I like the idea of marzipan, not the execution. Too sweet. And I'm sweet enough, sugar.

6:12 PM  
Blogger bluestocking said...

I like the idea of marzipan, not the execution. Too sweet.

There's not much that's too sweet for me. When I was a little girl, if I didn't have any candy around, I'd just eat brown sugar by the spoonful.

And I'm sweet enough, sugar.

I'm sure you are. I, however, am not. Only people who already like me a lot call me sweet, and then it's just at specific moments, not all the time. Extra sugar doesn't hurt me.

6:29 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Yum.

12:42 PM  
Blogger Dale said...

I'm sweet in a saccharine cancer causing way.

7:44 AM  
Blogger bluestocking said...

I'm sweet in a saccharine cancer causing way.

At least you'll never make anyone fat. Something to be said for that.

8:19 AM  

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