{Marth-Mallows}

It was about a year ago when my inclination toward homemade marshmallows began. I was lucky enough to experience these ones in hot cocoa at a rich friend's house last winter.

A few months later I moved to Belgium and was introduced to these little pretties. {Pierre Marcolini, by the way, is the Belgian chocolatier of the very rich.} Unfortunately, despite my ghastly high wages as a Belgian au pair to the very rich, I never could seem to save enough euros to try Monsieur Marcolini's mallows.

Then, I moved home, started Archives of our Lives, and meandered upon this blog [look down two posts] which inspired me to take matters into my own hands. I had to have the homemade mallows again; I became obsessed.

So bought the ingredients as specified in Martha's recipe here and invested four hours of my life into these mallows, and what follows are the results. Of my Friday night. {This is me married.}

See this?

Those are Martha's up there.

And these:

These are mine.

See any resemblance? Me either.

Then I remembered what my long-ago young womens advisor used to tell me in our cooking classes, "Never forget, Camille, about presentation. Presentation can make or break a meal." So then I remembered that everything looks better in an apothecary jar....


Still no resemblance?

I have been faced with a dreadful failure in the kitchen, and I am going to sleep sad and forlorn at 12:48 a.m. Rachel Ray never would have given me false hopes like Martha's recipe did. That's because Rachel Ray has never been a convicted felon...

I am changing my loyalties.