Meringue Crispies

Award winning authors Cindy Mushet and Sur La Table have yet again delivered an innovative and creative new cooking book called, Baking Kids Love.

All of the recipes are kid-inspired and have been tried and tested by kids and were only included if children loved baking and eating them!  Not only are the recipes sure to brighten up the faces and fill the tummies of your kids, but Mushet and Sur La Table have created a great way for families to reconnect and spend time together.

Here is one recipe out of Baking Kids Love that your kids are sure to love.  Try this out with your family!

MERINGUE CRISPIES

Baking Kids Love

Ingredients

• 3 large egg whites
• 3/4 cup sugar
• Colored sugar or candy-coated almonds, for decorating

Tools

• Measuring cups and spoons
• 2 baking sheets
• Parchment paper
• Large bowl
• Electric mixer
• 14-inch pastry bag and a 3/8-inch round plain tip

1. Before you begin
Position 1 oven rack in the top 1/3 of the oven and 1 oven rack in the bottom 1/3 of the oven, and preheat the oven to 225 degrees F. Line the baking sheets with the parchment paper.

2. Make the meringue
Be sure your bowl and beaters are very clean and there is not a speck of yolk in the egg whites. Any dirt or grease will prevent the whites from whipping. Put the egg whites in the large bowl. Using the mixer, beat on medium speed until they look like whipped cream and form soft peaks. To check, turn off the mixer, lift the beaters straight out, and then turn them upside down. The slope leading to the tip should be soft and barely holding its shape.

With the mixer on medium speed, add the sugar, about ¼ cup at a time, shaking it gently over the bowl and letting it blend in slowly. Once all the sugar has been added, turn the mixer to high speed and continue to beat for 1 to 2 minutes, until the mixture is very fluffy and shiny and forms firm peaks. This is a meringue. Turn off the mixer and check the peaks again. At this point, the slope should be nearly vertical.

3. Pipe the cookies
Put the tip into the pastry bag. Spoon the meringue into the bag until it is half full. Grasp the bag just above the mound of meringue and twist it 3 times (this prevents the mixture from coming out the wrong end of the bag).

Squeeze from the twisted part of the bag, while guiding the bag with a couple of fingers near the tip. Pipe the meringue onto the prepared baking sheets into any shape you like: letters of the alphabet, rounds, or zigzags, for example. Keep the tip of the bag about 1 inch from the surface of the pan, and let the meringue fall out of the bag onto the pan in a thick rope (see photos).

Once the bag is empty, untwist, open the top, and fill with the remaining meringue. Re-twist and continue piping until you have used all the meringue. If you like, sprinkle the cookies with colored sugar.

4. Bake the cookies
Place 1 baking sheet on each oven rack. Bake for 1 hour. Turn off the oven and leave the pans inside overnight to finish drying the meringues. Tape a note to the oven door reminding your family not to turn on the oven!

In the morning, remove the cookies from the oven and store them in an airtight container at room temperature. They will keep for up to 8 weeks, as long as they are kept dry.

Playing Around – Rattling meringue bones and fingers
For bones: Pipe the meringue into a stretched version of dog-bone treats.
For fingers: Pipe a straight line with a knobby center for the knuckle and a tapered end for the fingernail. Just before baking, set a colored candy almond or an almond slice into the meringue at the tapered end for a fingernail. Once the “fingers” have dried, dip the end opposite the fingernail into melted red coating chocolate for blood. Pipe a fancy ring on the finger with melted colored coating chocolate, and embellish it with “jewels” of colored sugars, dragées, or candy pearls.

So there you have it!  Did you kids enjoy baking them?  Did you enjoy baking them?  But, most importantly, how did it taste?

Let us know!