Cakes that look like meat

The OC Weekly has scoured Flickr for proud bakers' photos of their convincingly meat-like cakes and confections, assembling the best in a gallery called "Food Disguised As Other Food." Shown here: TV dinner cupcakes by gillianwallisbrett.

Food Disguised As Other Food (Thanks, Vickie!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

MORE: Entertainment

More at Boing Boing

Ants and Stars: Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic visit the Sardinia Radio Telescope in Italy

The Snowden Principle

Mark Crummett

What a weird cognitive dissonance you’d get from eating a cupcake that looks like peas and carrots.
Anonymous

My wife just got the book that these are from the other day. here’s a link:
http://www.hellocupcakebook.com/
Vidya108

They’re awesome. But, as I commented on the article, most of them are listed as containing fondant (with gelatin), and therefore are not “veggie-friendly” as described. (It’s no end of frustration when event planners order a fancy fondant cake, which can’t be eaten by vegetarians or observant members of a number of faith traditions.)
- Xopher
  
  Why would anyone put gelatin in fondant? That seems like a particularly stupid shortcut to me…but then I make my own fondant, borrowing my friends’ kitchen (with its granite countertops, too rich for my blood) for the purpose. Control the texture of the fondant by the boiling temperature of the sugar syrup, not by adding *ugh* gelatin!
- Xopher
  
  Also, with somewhat different principles, you can use pectin (which I’ve used) or agar (which I haven’t).
  
  Pectin isn’t quite as easy to use as gelatin. It’s not thermoreversible, for one thing (meaning you get only one chance at gelling it how you want; if you remelt it, it won’t solidify again). But it’s completely vegan!
Genutz

Haha! This is funny!
Lobster

BEEFCAKE!
Felton

Neat! My sister sent me this psych-out cupcake link the other day. I love the brain slug cupcakes.
General Specific

Excellent. There are some seriously imaginative and talented bakers out there.
Xopher

Illusion-food in general is called soteltie (pronounced, and perhaps a variant spelling of, ‘subtlety’).

These are some marvelous sotelties! I particularly like the mashed-potatos-and-gravy one.
Anonymous

Might cause a problem since taste is influenced by visual expectation: See:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00888lr
Anonymous

Cute! But it’s really “cake disguised as not cake.” And almost all of them are by the same person. Good plug for Debbie.
apoxia

So impressive! I particularly like the fruit platter.