Summer Scientific Survey: How do you like your marshmallows?

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Saturday, June 1. 2019

Summer Scientific Survey: How do you like your marshmallows?

I have always preferred my marshmallows to catch on fire to produce a somewhat burnt crust. Others like them just browned.

Campfires, and their suburban cousins firepits, seem to me to be a basic part of life. Fireplaces too, of course.

I know you are curious about the invention of the American delicacy, the S'more. Originally called a S'more Sandwich.

How do you like your marshmallows?

Posted by The Barrister in Food and Drink at 13:58 | Comments (20) | Trackbacks (0)

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I like them best when someone else eats them.

They are puffed sugar and it is very easy to OD on them.

#1 feeblemind on 2019-06-01 13:57 (Reply)

I agree, they are best when left on the supermarket shelf.

#2 Andrew Stanton on 2019-06-01 14:06 (Reply)

I'm with commenters #1 and #2.

#3 Peter Verdirame on 2019-06-01 14:15 (Reply)

ditto. Never liked the things, and now that I'm pre-diabetic they're poison even if they weren't before (and of course they were).

#3.1 JTW on 2019-06-01 22:00 (Reply)

Haven't eaten marshmallows in decades. I preferred them charred. Crisp on the outside, flowing on the inside. Like solid and liquid volcanic rock. I also grew up on Marshmallow Fluff. Which likewise I haven't eaten in decades. Growing up, I loved eating fluffernutter sandwiches.

#4 Gringo on 2019-06-01 14:31 (Reply)

Don't care for marshmallows. When I was a kid I ate Marshmallow Fluff straight out of the jar.

#4.1 barnhill on 2019-06-02 07:28 (Reply)

The only way to prove you were ever a kid is if you can remember the Fluffernutter March song from the advertisements (Oh you need Fluff! Fluff! Fluff! To make a Fluffernutter. Marshmallow Fluff - and lots of peanut butter! Da Da Da Da Dum... Dee Dum Dum Dum).

#4.1.1 Aggie on 2019-06-02 13:29 (Reply)

You will simply have to take my word for it. I hated Marshmallow Fluff and peanut butter.

#4.1.1.1 barnhill on 2019-06-02 14:46 (Reply)

I do not recall the ad with the Fluffernutter song. My parents didn't get a TV until I was 8, courtesy of an electronics whizz kid family friend who made one for us. Before we got the TV, I had been eating Fluffernutter sandwiches for several years. I do recall the Good and Plenty candy ad w Choo-choo Charlie.

#4.1.1.2 Gringo on 2019-06-02 15:58 (Reply)

Toast 'em on a stick. Marshmallow Mastery is one that's nicely browned and lava-like inside; flaming is failure. This requires great patience, so I tire of toasting after 1 or 2.

Never developed a liking for S'Mores; they're over-elaborate and effete. Something cobbled together for rich kids with hovering parents who send them to fancy summer camp. I've never met an adult S'More maker who didn't have some sort of a kink.

#5 Mike Anderson (Link) on 2019-06-01 16:35 (Reply)

Toasted golden brown = best flavor. Did my first 4-H presentation on S'mores. Still like them, just not often. But they must be campfire made.

#6 Blick on 2019-06-01 17:43 (Reply)

In someone else's pantry.

#7 LWS on 2019-06-01 18:35 (Reply)

I'm surprised to find I'm somewhat in the majority here, do not care for marshmallows. A fire-roasted hot dog, on the other hand, with a nicely charred crust.....maybe a little gritty from where it fell off the stick and dropped into the coals, but it's still good, it's still good, just brush it off a little, it'll be fine, wash it off with a little beer and stick it back in the fire for a minute, it'll be okay....

Find the coarse ground beef franks, almost like a smoked sausage. Yum.

#8 Jerryskids on 2019-06-01 19:22 (Reply)

Hot dogs on a stick! Amen. Definitely the campfire treat for boisterous boys of all ages. Two weenies at the end of forked stick toasted 'til they split is the Perfect Boys Meal. A lot less work, and a lot more taste, than even the most perfect marshmallow

#8.1 Mike Anderson (Link) on 2019-06-01 21:24 (Reply)

In upstate NY grilled hot dogs are the preferred way of preparing them.

I was talking with someone else from the downstate/NYC metro area. We agreed- down there boiled or prepared on those rollers like they used to do in Woolworths is the way to prepare hot dogs.

To each their own.

Charcoal grilled burgers- that's the best summer casual eating.

#8.1.1 Gospace (Link) on 2019-06-02 20:00 (Reply)

Really don't like marshmallows

#9 faculty wife on 2019-06-01 23:28 (Reply)

Loved them as a kid - brown on the outside and liquid on the inside - hot enough to melt the chocolate please! I don't know what happens to tastebuds but I don't like marshmallow any more either and I've become a chocolate snob. That said, a s'more can be just as good as when I was a kid, if it's carefully crafted by a child and handed to you with all earnestness. If you don't really think about what you are eating but focus on what you are sharing in. I'd like to recommend "Cooking with Fire" by Paula Marcoux (archeologist). Visually sumptuous, interesting and useful. Be forewarned you might find yourself building a Neolithic fire pit.

#10 Karen on 2019-06-02 09:41 (Reply)

Still in the bag.

#11 Sam L. on 2019-06-02 10:09 (Reply)

True story.

Harley grew up on a farm in Oklahoma in the 1930s. One Saturday they drove to town in their pickup, Mom & Dad in the front and Harley riding in the back. They bought groceries in town before heading home,including a sack of marshmallows.

So Harley is riding home in the back of the pickup, looking at that sack of marshmallows riding on the top of a box of groceries. The marshmallows were calling him so he opened the bag and hoped his mom wouldn't mind if he ate one or two. Well, one or two progressed to about a quarter of the bag. When Harley realized he had eaten so many and he would surely be in trouble, his 10 year old brain decided the best course of action was to eat them all and hope his mom had forgotten she bought them.

He started stuffing marshmallows down as fast as he could, but now they weren't going down as easy as they were earlier. He realized he just wasn't going to be able to finish them before they arrived home. So . . . about a quarter mile from home as the pickup crossed a bridge over a creek, Harley hurled the 1/3 full sack of marshmallows over the bridge.

After they got home, his mom was putting groceries away and noticed the sack was missing. "Harley, did you notice that sack of marshmallows in any of those boxes of groceries.", she asked. "No ma'am." was his quick reply.

But by now little Harley wasn't feeling well. He had lost his appetite and wouldn't eat supper. The first thing his mother asked was, What did you eat?" "Nothin' . . . nothin' " was Harley's reply.

Well, his parents were worried and turned around and went back to town and took him to the doctor. The doctor examined him and said it felt like he had a watermelon in his stomach. "What did you eat?" He asked little Harley. "Nothin' . . . didn't eat nothin'" Harley replied.

The doctor scatched his head and said if the boy hadn't eaten anything he didn't know what it could be, but he gave him a dose of castor oil for good measure and sent him home.

Harley was off his feed all the next day as well and was then back to his old self. He escaped the dreaded parental justice, for now, but what about the missing marshmallows?

The next Saturday Harley and his folks made their weekly trip to town for groceries. When they walked in the store, Harley held his breath as his mother asked the grocer about the missing marshmallows. "Hmmmm . . . ." said the grocer. "I remember you buying them last week. I must have forgot to put them in the box." Harley let out a sigh of relief. The case was solved and he had beaten the rap. However, he had learned his lesson. He never tried to eat a sack of marshmallows again.

#12 feeblemind on 2019-06-02 11:31 (Reply)

Just browned.

But I may have to forego them and smores forevermore. We'll see what the next A1C level says....

#13 Gospace (Link) on 2019-06-02 19:54 (Reply)

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Saturday, June 1. 2019

Summer Scientific Survey: How do you like your marshmallows?