A home baker has gone viral for creating a toilet paper-themed cake.
Kate Pritchett, a public servant from Sydney, Australia, created the cake as she has had toilet paper "on the mind a lot lately" amid the worldwide pandemic.
"I'd just been thinking a lot about how we've come to fetishize toilet paper and have made it distressingly out of reach for many vulnerable people who can't stockpile," she told the PA news agency.
Photos of the cake were posted to Twitter by Ms. Pritchett's husband Michael Harris, and they quickly reached more than 100,000 likes.
Somebody suggested my wife should make a toilet paper cake. So she did. https://t.co/8aqoRRevMb— Michael Harris (@Michael Harris) 1585705353.0
People were quite impressed.
@MichaelH_PhD Very well done!! How soon can I get a 24 pack?— TrustData (@TrustData) 1585707969.0
@naufalhilmyp @MichaelH_PhD Art.— Art Or Not Art (@Art Or Not Art) 1585708724.0
@MichaelH_PhD that cake looks amazing! my god, your wife is an artist ☺️— Helen (@Helen) 1585705998.0
It truly is a thing of beauty.
The cake, which took five hours to bake, is made of dark chocolate and a Japanese black sugar called kokuto, along with vanilla buttercream and mochi fondant.
Ms. Pritchett, 41, said the attention the cake had received was "lovely but a little surprising; I make much more complicated cakes all the time!"
Fish down. https://t.co/CF4BpS4WSw— Kate Pritchett (@Kate Pritchett) 1574047800.0
My woman: “I think I’m going to make a floating Snitch cake..” Me, figuring she meant it’d bob around on a wire or… https://t.co/fahyNknXLV— Michael Harris (@Michael Harris) 1567920404.0
With stockpiling of some items being reported across the world, toilet paper has become an unlikely symbol of the outbreak, with shortages in many supermarkets.
British supermarkets including Sainsbury's and Tesco responded by limiting sales of essential items and introducing special opening hours for disabled, elderly, and vulnerable customers.
Ms. Pritchett told PA:
"I'm really not making light of a situation so many people find difficult, but I do truly love how delighted people seem to be about cake."