At last, marshmallows from a spray can
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Liquid marshmallow is softer than the familiar square ones but much thicker than whipped cream. Photos courtesy of Sh'mallow
If you've ever secretly wished you could spray marshmallows on your hot chocolate as easily as Reddi-wip, you're in luck.
- Sh'mallow, a mom-and-pop startup out of Portland, Oregon, has started selling aerosol cans of dairy-free marshmallow topping.
- It's suitable for spraying directly on s'mores, ice cream or into your mouth (assuming no one is looking).
- A 3-pack costs $30 and comes with a mini-torch for toasting.
Backstory: Kenny Baker, a truck driver for a commercial water and sewer pipe company, developed Sh'mallow after a prior career working in coffee shops and watching hot chocolate being served.
- "It just hit me that there has to be a way for marshmallows to come out like whipped cream," Baker tells Axios.
- Marshmallows, he said, are seldom stocked at coffee shops because they go stale easily and wind up getting thrown away. "They just become a hassle, when everything can be whipped cream," he said.
Baker — a home cook with a background in construction, firefighting and truck driving — said he "just started tinkering with at-home aerosol whipped cream equipment" and marshmallow recipes.
- The resulting formulation — "basically sugar and egg whites" — is dairy-free, gluten-free and kosher.
- It's also gelatin-free. "You can't put the gelatin in there because it would seize up inside the can," Baker said.
After he fine-tuned the product, finding an affordable co-packer proved difficult — so he set up shop near his home in Oregon City, Oregon, and started producing cans of Sh'mallow with his wife, Laura, and his parents.
- They're selling it online, at farmers' markets and fairs, and at about 20 stores in Oregon and Northern California.
- They're bringing it to the Specialty Food Association's Summer Fancy Food Show, which started on Sunday at NYC's Javits Center.
Details: Liquid marshmallow is softer than the familiar square ones, but much thicker than whipped cream, Baker says.
- "It does not have to be refrigerated, but we encourage you to refrigerate it," he said. When it's cold, "it actually sprays out with a tighter-type marshmallow and holds its peaks longer."
- Baker recommends applying it to strawberries, lemon curd, adult beverages and — his favorite — chocolate ice cream, "so you don't have to worry about nuts in your rocky road."
