{"id":1680,"date":"2010-08-07T21:43:29","date_gmt":"2010-08-07T13:43:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/?p=1680"},"modified":"2010-11-16T21:41:35","modified_gmt":"2010-11-16T13:41:35","slug":"1680","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/1680\/","title":{"rendered":"Meringue nests with berry and cream topping"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I have always loved having friends over for dinner parties more than going out to a restaurant.\u00a0 Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind paying someone to create delicious food and to\u00a0do the washing up for me.\u00a0 I just like to try and create things that I think my friends enjoy eating.\u00a0 I used to be a really bad dinner party hostess, trying to do too many dishes, spending way too much time in the kitchen and never enough time with my guests.\u00a0 Over the years I have learnt that it isn’t just about the food but the whole experience.\u00a0 These days I try to balance\u00a0things a little better, still creating good food but many of the things I do are made ahead of time and just assembled close to serving.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of the desserts that fits in\u00a0this category is meringue.\u00a0\u00a0I love\u00a0the fact that with only two main ingredients (egg whites and sugar)\u00a0a delicious, delicate shell can be created and set aside until it is time for the adornment.\u00a0 Meringue can also travel well as mentioned in my meringue stack<\/a> post, so it is a great thing to make if you are asked to take a dessert to a party.\u00a0 I also like that making this kind of dish means using an ingredient (egg whites) that may otherwise be thrown away.\u00a0 Waste not want not is definitely one of my philosophies.<\/p>\n

G’s good friend, M returned from a trip overseas a few days ago so we were eager to have him over for dinner to hear how much fun he had.\u00a0 I decided to cook a roast lamb with duck fat potatoes and other vegetables along with my prepare-ahead dessert.\u00a0 The recipe I chose to use came from Stephanie Alexander’s “The Cook’s Companion” and while\u00a0her recipe for orange cake<\/a> I made recently didn’t suit my purpose, the recipe for “Sue’s Meringues” was perfect.\u00a0 The clincher that made me use this recipe was part of the comment prior to the recipe “……..you can turn leftover egg whites into a wonderful treat that stores well and turns simple berries into a special dessert.”<\/p>\n

meringue nests with berry and cream\u00a0topping \u2013 (recipe from The Cook’s Companion adapted by Fiona at Food 4 Thought)
\nmakes three large nests with little tops<\/span><\/p>\n

Ingredients
\n<\/span>meringue nests\u00a0<\/em>
\n2 eggs whites (70g\/2.5ozs)
\n1\/2 cup (100g\/3.5ozs) caster sugar
\n1\/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
\ntopping<\/em>
\n250g\/8ozs frozen blueberries, thawed
\n1 tablespoon lemon juice
\n1 1\/2 tablespoons (30g\/1oz) castor sugar
\n250g strawberries
\n200ml whipping cream
\nto<\/em> serve,<\/em> sliced strawberries
\n\u00a0
\nPreparation<\/span>
\nPreheat oven to 150\u00b0C\u00a0\u00a0(300\u00b0F\/Gas 2) and line a baking tray with non-stick baking paper.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For meringues,<\/em>\u00a0place egg whites into large bowl of an electric mixer, beat until stiff peaks form and then add sugar, a little at a time, still beating.\u00a0 Beat in vanilla and continue beating until all sugar has dissolved.\u00a0 Test by dipping your finger into the mixture and rubbing fingers together, if it feels smooth the sugar is dissolved.\u00a0 Place large spoonfuls of mixture onto baking tray approximately 10 cm\/4 inches in diameter.\u00a0 Hollow out the centre and smooth edges to create a nest like shape.\u00a0 Repeat to make three nests.\u00a0 With remaining mixture, place spoonfuls onto tray and using the back of a spoon swirl on top to create a tip.\u00a0 These will become the lids.\u00a0 Bake for 45 minutes.\u00a0 When cooked, leave the oven door slightly ajar and allow meringues to cool completely in oven.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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When ready to assemble make topping\u00a0<\/em>by\u00a0<\/em>placing blueberries, lemon juice and sugar into a small saucepan and heating until simmered for 3 – 5 minutes or until the berries begin to soften.\u00a0 Pour\u00a0into a sieve over a bowl and allow to drain well.\u00a0 Return the reserved liquid to the saucepan and simmer for a further 5 minutes or until it is reduced to a thick syrup.\u00a0 In the meantime, place blueberries into a bowl, hull strawberries and cut into similar size pieces to match blueberries.\u00a0 Add to bowl and mix to combine, set aside.<\/p>\n

Whip cream until soft peaks form.<\/p>\n

To serve, place meringue nest into serving bowls, add 1 tablespoon of berries to each nest, cover with cream then divide remaining berries between nests.\u00a0 Top with a little\u00a0more cream then place meringue lid on top.\u00a0 Drizzle with blueberry\u00a0and lemon syrup and decorate with a sliced strawberry.\u00a0<\/p>\n

My tips\/alterations:\u00a0 *To increase or decrease the quantities for the meringue recipe the general rule of thumb is to allow 60g\/2.1ozs of sugar per egg white.\u00a0 I like to allow about 50g\/1.75ozs which means that the centre has a more chewy texture rather than being like marshmallow.\u00a0 *You may need to experiment with your oven and how it cooks meringues as that will affect the outcome and ever oven is different.\u00a0 *If syrupy droplets form on the surface of the meringues after cooking, you will know that you have overcooked them; liquid oozing from the meringues means that they are undercooked.\u00a0 *<\/span><\/span>You <\/span>can store the meringues in an airtight container lined with greaseproof paper.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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ease: 7\/10.<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Meringue can be tricky at first\u00a0but once you get it right it is simple from then on.
\nprep time:<\/strong>\u00a020mins <\/strong>for meringues + 10mins<\/strong> for topping, sauce\u00a0and assembly.\u00a0<\/strong>
\ncooking time: 50mins.<\/strong>
\ntotal: 1 hour 20mins.<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

taste: 9\/10.<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Talk about impressive!\u00a0 There was immediate silence when these were consumed aside from the undertones of pleasurable moans and groans coming from all corners of the table.\u00a0 To say that we all loved these seems like such an understatement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The meringue was crunchy on the outside but sticky on the inside, just the way we like it.\u00a0 The soft cream provided the little bit of richness to carry the berries which provided a textural and flavour contrast to the meringue.\u00a0 The syrup was a perfect balance of sweetness with that little but very important zing of the lemon.<\/p>\n

This would have to be on my top 10 dessert list.\u00a0<\/p>\n

would I make it again:\u00a0\u00a0Without hesitation.<\/strong>\u00a0 Make ahead, delicious\u00a0and impressive, that’s my kind of dish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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I have always loved having friends over for dinner parties more than going out to a restaurant. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind paying someone to create delicious food and to do the washing up for me. I just like to try and create things that I think my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1687,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[79,81,58,31,28,49,27],"tags":[12,4,128,104,101,120,100],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1680"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1680"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1680\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1950,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1680\/revisions\/1950"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1687"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.foodfourthought.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}