Illusion Food to Trick Your Taste Buds

Who can forget Yan’s ‘banana-ramen’ cake on this year’s series of The Great British Bake Off? An excellent pun and a banana-flavoured cake that looked like a bowl of ramen – is there anything more you could possibly want from a bake?!

The illusion cake round on episode one of GBBO 2017 saw bakes that looked like everything from watermelons to pancake stacks and handbags, giving Paul and Prue’s taste buds a real trick. If it looks like a handbag, why does it taste like chocolate and not leather?! With the rise of the illusion food trend, these are the sorts of questions our taste buds will have to contemplate on a more regular basis.

Cakes that look like something else are only one rung on the illusion food ladder (which is probably made out of icing and not metal, so watch your footing). There is a whole word of illusion food out there that’s prepared to trick your mind and taste buds by masquerading as something else. Here are a few examples:

Now, we know cauliflower is not a steak. If you’re a red meat lover, cauliflower is never going to cut it as an alternative to a juicy beefy steak. But if you’re trying to cut down on your red meat consumption, or you’re a vegan and still want to join in with Friday steak night with the family, cauliflower steak could be the answer to all your problems.

Basically, you need to cut chunky slices of cauliflower and cook them as if they were steaks. This could be on the barbecue, you could chargrill them or you might want to pan-fry them in your favourite marinade. Serve with chips, salad, fried onions and mushrooms like you would a traditional steak, and see if your taste buds notice the difference (they will, but not necessarily in a bad way).

Ever considered going veggie, but not sure you could live without bacon? You’re not alone, as bacon is often one of the hardest meats for people to give up. But could your taste buds be tricked into thinking smoked pieces of carrot or even coconut are bacon instead? Sceptical? Us too.

However, we came across a recipe from This Mess is Ours where dried coconut flakes have somehow been made to look like real-life crispy bacon. There was no sorcery involved, only soy sauce, liquid smoke (ok, maybe a little bit of sorcery) and a few spices. You can try the same with carrot if you’re not a fan of coconut and trust us, your mind will be well and truly blown.

You’ve probably already seen cauliflower rice – two years ago, who would have thought cauliflower would turn out to be so versatile?! – on the supermarket shelves, but if it’s not your cup of tea, you might want to try broccoli rice instead.

It’s made in pretty much the same way as its cauliflower counterpart, in that it’s whizzed up in a food processor until it becomes grainy and resembles rice (if you squint a bit and ignore the fact that it’s green).

Broccoli rice is perfect for serving alongside a curry or stew, as it’ll soak up all of your lovely sauce while significantly reducing the number of calories in your dinner.

Look, cauliflower again! This time masquerading as chicken wings. No, cauliflower is not a bird, does not have wings and is one of the few foods that does not taste like chicken.

But when covered in a spicy batter and served alongside a gorgeous dipping sauce, you can pretend the bite-sized cauliflower pieces you’re eating are actually chicken wings – even if it’s just for a few seconds. Check out this recipe for a vegan version of the snack from Global Mouse Travels.

Now, we’re not suggesting that you cover your Sunday roast beef (or roast cauliflower, depending on which camp you fall into) in mushy peas, but you can make a pretty tasty gravy with tinned mushy peas as a key ingredient, meaning it’s veggie-friendly due to no meat juices being needed.

Fat Girl Skinny has instructions for how to make this on her blog. Of course, if you’re going for a veggie version, swap the beef stock for vegetable.

If you have no desire to give up bacon, no one is making you, but if you’re considering trying Veganuary or want to make a few healthy changes to your diet, illusion food is a really fun and varied place to start.

Good food certainly doesn’t have to involve meat and it doesn’t need to involve an addiction to cauliflower either – get experimenting with different vegetables and marinades and see what you can come up with!