Making Meringues Inspired by Jamie Oliver

When I was at the library the other day browsing for new cookbooks, I came across Jamie Oliver's book, Cook with Jamie: My Guide to Making You a Better Cook (2007). Since, I love looking through cookbooks and this one had tons of photographs, I added it to my pile despite not being a fan of Oliver's persona or cooking style (traditional British with a strong emphasis on game, ie duck, rabbit, lamb, etc.).

Enjoying the break in the gloomy weather this weekend, I sat outside and looked through Oliver's cookbook. While it was definitely not my cup of tea, I was intrigued by his dessert section on meringues. In part because I just read a recipe from Cooking Light magazine for a coconut cake that instead of frosting called for Italian meringue in the middle of the two cake layers. Prior to the recipe, I didn't even know there were different types of meringues!

So what I did like about Oliver's book is that he broke down the types of meringues and gave pointers for making the low-cal, light and fluffy dessert treats! The three types of meringues Oliver mentioned were cooked meringues, Italian meringues and French meringues. The recipes in his book are for French meringues, which are the easiest because you do not need to cook them over the stove, so you can use a mixer.

To make my first batch of meringues, I cracked six eggs and put the egg whites into my mixing bowl. I then put the mixer on medium for ten minutes. Oliver wrote that the egg whites should form stiff peaks before you add the sugar. They should be so stiff that you could lift the bowl over your head and nothing would fall out of it! Since I wasn't putting a bowl over my head, I put a spoon into the bowl and held the spoon upside down. When none of the egg whites dripped off, I knew it was time to add the sugar.

Oliver said to gradually add one cup and five tablespoons of sifted superfine sugar while mixing. However, I only had about 3/4 of a cup of superfine sugar and I was too lazy to sift the sugar so I mixed regular sugar with superfine sugar and just made sure there were no lumps! I put my mixer on high and let it mix for ten minutes before I noticed the change in texture as the egg whites were now a glossy white. It was done when I rubbed the mixture between my fingers and it felt smooth.

When the mixture was smooth, I moved the bowl to the counter and flavored the meringues to have a hint of chocolate raspberry essence. To do this, I folded in some raspberry extract, red food dye and two tablespoons of cocoa powder. Then, I put the meringue mixture into a piping bag and made some swirls for cookies and inverted swirls to use for bowls onto two baking trays covered in wax paper. I placed the trays into a 300 degree preheated oven for one hour.

When the meringues were done, I took them out of the oven and I noticed that some of the swirls had cracked. Upon tasting them, I also realized that the smaller the meringue, the better because after one bite the top caves in and the meringue gets crummy. On the other hand, all of the bowls I made came out perfect so I was going to use them to create my dessert!

Looking at a combination of Oliver's recipes for a fruit meringue and floating islands, I decided to make my own whipped cream that I would spoon into each of the meringue bowls. I poured my leftover heavy cream (from the penne a la vodka) and added sugar and vanilla to taste and whipped it in the mixer until a cream was formed.

Once the cream was spooned very gently into the bowls, I made a berry compote that would act as a drizzle. The tartness of the berries would also contradict nicely against the sweetness of the whipped cream. To make the compote, I chopped up frozen strawberries and put them into a pan on warm along with some frozen blueberries and raspberries. I then added about a 1/4 cup of sugar and a few drops of lemon juice. When a sauce was formed, I drizzled it over the whipped cream filled meringues.

To top off my creation, I attempted to make spun sugar. This is done by heating up (and constantly stirring) one cup of water and one cup of sugar in a pan with a candy thermometer. When the temperature reaches 325 degrees, the mixture turns to carmel. I then took the pot (as Oliver suggests) and put it into cold water to stop the carmel from cooking. When the carmel was just right, I tried to flick it onto oiled waxed paper. When I flicked it, little shreds of sugar that looked like string came off the fork hardened. I was not able to get much spun sugar and definitely need more experience working with the sugar, but I did decorate the dessert with a little bit of the sugar I made and some hardened carmel.

I give this dessert an 'A' because it was also very simple to make and doesn't require many ingredients (sugar and eggs only!) Making meringues was fun, but not a task I would do without a mixer. However, I felt the meringues I made tasted like hazelnut instead of chocolate so I might want to play around with the flavors and colors next time. I would also make smaller meringue cookies to eat, but the bowls came out fine! I really enjoyed the flavors of the whipped cream, berry compote and crunchiness of the meringue because it was light and delicious! There is so much to do with meringues that next maybe I'll make Eton mess!