Meringue

As part of the rewards for the boys' summer chores, I let them pick a meal for me to make for dinner. This year, Lucas picked a dessert that had baked meringue pieces. I have never made meringue before, and if I ever need to do it again, I would like to document what I learned from trial and error during this process so I will be better equipped next time. I think after my third batch, I had about mastered my meringue. For this particular recipe, I was taking the finished (purple) meringue and baking it, but I think all of these tips and tricks will mostly apply to a non-cooked meringue as well (such as a meringue on top of a lemon pie) but may require the use of a double-boiler to cook the eggs for safe eating.

Meringue

Ingredients:

• 4 egg whites
• 1 cup powdered sugar or superfine castor sugar (regular sugar pulsed in a blender works too)
• 1/2 tsp cream of tartar
• 1 tsp. cornstarch
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Mix your sugar and cream of tartar together, set aside.
2. Beat your egg whites at medium-high to high speed until foamy with the wire whisk attachment.
3. Once foamy, begin to to slowly incorporate your sugar mixture over the course of about a minute with the mixture on high.
4. Beat your egg mixture on high speed until you achieve glossy stiff peaks. Once the meringue starts to get glossy, you can check to see if it's done by removing the bowl from the mixer, swirling your wire whisk through the meringue and then pull the whisk out and flip it upside down to check for a nice peak on the end of your whisk.
5. Add any extracts, flavorings or food coloring at this stage and whip just until combined.
6. Once the meringue reaches your desired consistency, place into a piping bag. Line a baking sheet with parchment or a non-stick mat and pipe into your desired shapes. Alternatively, spoon the entire thing into a nest-like pile in the middle of the baking sheet for a pavlova.
7. Bake at 210 degrees for 90 minutes (or more or less), depending on the end result you are going for and how thick your meringue creations are. The rule of thumb tends to be, the meringue is done when it is dry on the outside and easily releases from the parchment paper when moved or pushed (at least for small meringues). Some meringue cookies bake in as little as 25-30 minutes, while some pavlovas take more than 90 minutes.
8. Once your are done cooking your meringue, turn the oven off (some people recommend cracking the door open for about 10 minutes with a towel to release any accumulated moisture in the oven cavity and then close the door) and let the meringue continue to cool for several hours or overnight in the closed oven.

Marsha's Notes:

The entire "whipping" portion of making meringue should usually take less than 10 minutes. If you beat meringue too much, it will become overworked and loose its structure. From my very limited experience, it seems like when the mixture starts to look glossy and begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl, that is about when it's ready to be done. You can check to see if it's done by removing the bowl from the mixer, swirling your wire whisk through the meringue and then pull the whisk out and flip it upside down to check for a nice peak on the end of your whisk. The Internet has all kinds of great pictures of what it should look like, just like this picture.

The inside of Meringue should be soft and marshmallow-y, while the outside should be crisp. If you bake your meringue too long, the entire inside will cook and get crispy. If you undercook it, it might collapse or start to weep.

This is a great shot of what the inside looks like, with a crust on the outside and a nice creamy center.

Some methods of making meringue include dissolving the sugar in the eggs over a double-boiler on the stove before whisking to make sure everything gets perfectly dissolved, or making a hot sugar syrup that is whipped into the egg whites. Apparently these techniques are mostly used for non-baked meringues (like the top of a lemon pie) to cook the eggs to make them safe to eat. 

I saw different recommendations for using a combination of powdered sugar and a fine-granulated sugar. Not wanting to overly complicate an already complicated process, I opted for all powdered sugar hoping for great texture (not grainy), and everything seemed to work great like that.