Red Carpet Ready
Meringue mushrooms—with or without eggs
The award for best actor in an utterly unexpected role goes to … the chickpea.
The legume, which also works under the stage name garbanzo, stars in such classics as falafel, hummus, and three-bean salad. Typically typecast as low cost and high protein, the staple is, in real life, low cost and high protein. It also stands in for flour in pasta and potatoes in chips.
Late in such a long career, the chickpea might have been up for lifetime achievement. No one expected a box office smash. No one expected aquafaba.
The plot, based on a true story, goes like this: Software engineer Goose Wohlt pries open a can of chickpeas. He’s about to toss the viscous goo when he does a double take. Strangely, he pours the liquid into a bowl and whips it like egg whites. Strangely, it acts like egg whites, billowing into glossy meringue.
In a flashback, we see his inspiration: French tenor Joël Roessel and other early bean-water pioneers. As the music swells, the camera pans over a burly bartender shaking up a fizzy cocktail, a pregnant chef folding fluffy mousse, a vegan baker piping delicate meringue mushrooms. All smile with relief: no eggs, no raw-egg worries. In the final scene, the miraculous bean water is renamed aquafaba, which means bean water.
Roll credits.
