It may just well be the greatest thing since sliced bread. Or at least the prettiest.
It involves dyed cream cheese, sprinkles, gold leaf flakes and sliced bread and it鈥檚 being spread all over the internet. 鈥淯nicorn toast鈥� and its recently evolved counterpart 鈥渕ermaid toast鈥� have taken social media by storm in a viral food craze that has inspired countless imitations.
The has been attributed to Miami-based food stylist and photographer Adeline Waugh. The savvy blogger, also known as , has been experimenting with natural ingredients to dye cream cheese for at least a year according to the highly stylized and extremely colourful photos she鈥檚 uploaded to her account. When she began posting photos of pastel coloured-cream cheese blended together on toast with sprinkles on top last fall, a new fad was born.
To create the popular design, the food stylist used natural ingredients to dye the cream cheese, such as hot beet juice for pink, turmeric for yellow, chlorophyll for green, spirulina power for light blue, freeze-dried blueberry powder for purple and a beet juice and freeze-dried strawberry or raspberry powder for light pink.
, Waugh described how she stumbled upon the colours while she was experimenting in her kitchen.
鈥淚 was just playing around in my kitchen and trying to figure out how I could make hot pink cream cheese, as one does,鈥� she wrote. 鈥淎fter playing around with all the cream cheese colors and blending them together to create new colors, I loved how they appeared to resemble paintbrush strokes.鈥�
Waugh said she originally called her creation 鈥渨atercolour toast鈥� but her Instagram friends quickly dubbed it 鈥渦nicorn toast鈥� instead. The food trend has been replicated in countless photos uploaded to the social media site. A quick search of the term revealed hundreds of imitation unicorn toasts with varying degrees of success.
鈥淚 absolutely love scrolling through the #unicorntoast & #mermaidtoast hashtags and seeing all of the beautiful renditions of my toast creations,鈥� Waugh recently wrote on Instagram.
Waugh said her creation really took off after she was interviewed for features in U.S. media outlets such as MTV, New York Post and the Dr. Oz Show. All of that attention inevitably invited some attention from online critics who questioned the practicality of the vibrant toast and questioned why she would waste her time creating the toast.
Unicorn Toast. JUST. NO.
鈥� kay plunkett-hogge (@kplunketthogge)
"Unicorn Toast" �� who would even eat cream cheese on toast
鈥� Anna Lucy (@annahopeless)
It looks really pretty, but is this new food craze worth the time and effort?
鈥� Clarissa Phillips (@clarissap83)
鈥淚've never claimed to be starting a trend or a putting out a new recipe that is super practical 鈥� it's 100 per cent impractical, I just like to play around in the kitchen and attempt to create something aesthetically pleasing and unique from time to time,鈥� Waugh said in a recent post.
The trendsetter has clearly not let the recent negativity prevent her from doing what she loves. Earlier this month, Waugh showcased her latest invention 鈥� mermaid toast. Similar in concept to the unicorn toast, mermaid toast involves a variety of blue green algae powders and liquids mixed with almond milk cream cheese to create an ocean-like palette. Gold leaf flakes can be sprinkled on as well for added effect.
The blogger said she decided to call it mermaid toast to 鈥渃ontinue the tradition of naming toast after mythical creatures.鈥�
So much for plain old butter.
