Meringue or meringue: cooking methods, history and interesting facts

Meringue can be safely called a culinary paradox – being a very simple confectionery product from only two components (protein and sugar), it manages to look like a real delicacy. And sometimes it requires considerable culinary skills, as well as knowledge of a large number of nuances. Today’s guest post from the Manif TV project presents to your attention something that will be interesting and useful for all sweet lovers to learn.

Meringue or meringue?

Meringue can be safely called a culinary paradox – being a very simple confectionery product from only two components (protein and sugar), it manages to look like a real delicacy. And sometimes it requires considerable culinary skills, as well as knowledge of a large number of nuances. Today’s guest post from the Manif TV project presents to your attention something that will be interesting and useful for all sweet lovers to learn.

There is an opinion that meringue and meringue are not the same thing. According to this opinion, meringue is an egg cream made from whipped whites with sugar, and meringue is a crispy product made from meringue in a specific shape. Whether this opinion is legitimate or not is a matter for a separate discussion. Further in the article, the word “meringue” will mean exactly the protein cream, and the word meringue – baked crisp.

The very same word “meringue” (fr. Baiser) came to us from the French language, and is translated as “kiss”. The origin of the word “meringue” is not so unambiguous. According to one version, it also came from the French language, which came from German, namely from the name of the Swiss city of Meiringen (German Meiringen), where the treat was first invented and baked by the pastry chef Gasparini. Date of appearance – XVII century.

Like a lot of other ingenious inventions, meringue was born purely by accident – Gasparini once got so carried away by whipping proteins that they turned into a cool foam. Since this gentleman loved culinary experiments, he, without hesitation, sent the foam to the oven. The result was a crispy cake that quickly gained popularity among the local nobility, and then among the common people.

At the end of the XNUMXth century, the meringue recipe in the form in which it is used today appeared in the cookbook of the famous chef François Massialo.

There is a version that Massialo developed this recipe on his own, so as not to throw away the egg whites, which were often unnecessary. And he also introduced the term “meringue” into use. Whether he created this recipe himself or relied on the experience of his Swiss colleague is not known for certain. However, the fact that meringue quickly gained popularity due to its taste and ease of manufacture is a fact.

Meringue recipes

There are three meringue recipes:

• French (the one we are used to)
• Swiss
• Italian

General rules for making meringues

• The container in which the eggs are beaten must be absolutely dry, without droplets of water and fat. Just one crazy drop of water left on the sides of the pan for beating eggs – and you can forget about the thick, standing foam. Even if the foam almost churns, a liquid syrup will accumulate at the bottom, preventing the proteins from whipping to sharp peaks (this is usually called a steep, almost stationary foam).
• Sugar should be added only after the whites have been whipped into a light foam – otherwise, the same effect may be observed as if there are droplets of moisture or fat on the walls of the container. The exception is Swiss meringue.

Separate the egg whites from the yolks, then beat the whites until they are slightly stiff. Then continue whisking until a thick, standing foam, gradually adding sugar. Squeeze meringue of any shape from the finished meringue, put it on paper and send it to the oven, preheated to 100-110 degrees. Leave the oven door ajar while baking. After two to three hours, remove the leaf from the oven and voila – you have sweet crispy meringues in front of you.

You can add coffee to the meringue to give it a beautiful shade and a more sophisticated taste: unlike cocoa, it does not precipitate proteins. It is not necessary to scrape off the meringues at all – after cooling, they flake off the parchment by themselves. Prepare a container with hot water, and place a bowl in it for beating eggs.

Pour the egg whites and powdered sugar into a cup, then whisk. The peculiarity of this method is that all the sugar can be added to the proteins at once. Having received a thick, homogeneous standing foam, squeeze the meringues out of it, and send it to an oven preheated to 100-110 degrees. Bezet is much thicker and denser than the classic Swiss style, and also prone to quick drying. Molds from it can be baked in an hour, or even less, and being hard on the outside, they will remain soft on the inside.

Swiss meringue is quite elastic and keeps its shape perfectly. From it you can make meringues with ornate patterns that will not spread and will not sag. Some cooks put a water bath on the stove and whisk right there, but we do not recommend doing this, since the water can easily overheat on the stove. The temperature of the water for heating should not exceed 42-43 degrees. The Italian style meringue is truly light and airy. To prepare it, first pour sugar into a saucepan, and cover with water, bring the mixture to a boil and cook until the sugar dissolves and the mixture thickens slightly.

Then remove the syrup from the burner. Whisk the whites into a slightly standing foam, then pour hot syrup into it very slowly in a thin stream (it should not have time to cool down too much, but at the same time, it should not be boiling). When pouring the syrup, beat the mass vigorously until it is completely thickened. In the first moments, it may seem that the mixture is too liquid and will not whip at all – do not give in to this impression, because with due persistence, the meringue is whipped very successfully. From such a cream, you can make light air meringues that melt in your mouth (baked in the same way as the two previous varieties).

However, it is better to use it for coating cakes, because it does not dry for a long time and does not exfoliate, unlike its French and Swiss counterparts.

• Even one drop of yolk will put a fat cross on the thick foam. To prevent this, you can use this trick: break the egg at both ends – the white will come out on its own, and the yolk will remain in the egg. Leftover protein can be scraped out by breaking the broken egg lengthwise. And if a drop of yolk nevertheless slipped into the protein mass, it can be pulled out by prying it with an eggshell.
• Merengi are rather dried rather than baked. That is why, throughout the entire cooking process, the oven must be kept slightly open (1-1,5 cm). In a closed oven, the meringues will remain soft (due to incomplete drying) and may burn.
• You should not use stale powdered sugar for whipping proteins – it should only be freshly prepared. Otherwise, the effect will be the same as in the first paragraph, because the powdered sugar after a short time is saturated with moisture, absorbing it from the air.

• Store the meringues in a sealed container or in a tightly tied bag, otherwise they will absorb moisture from the air and soften. However, there is an interesting point – if you manage to put very slightly softened meringues in a closed container for a while, they will restore their hardness and dryness. True, with the meringues, which are softened to a greater extent, such a number will not work.

Interesting facts about merengue

A type of Latin American dance is also called Merengoy. And it should be noted that the rhythms of this dance are very similar to the rhythms of a mixer whipping whites. In tsarist Russia, instead of the word “meringue”, the term “Spanish wind” was used. It was believed that their lightness and rustling are very similar to the warm summer breeze.

In dry weather with low humidity, it is much easier to beat eggs into a thick, standing foam than in high humidity. The consistency of an egg cream will be extremely thick without the addition of the notorious pinch of salt or citric acid. The largest meringue was baked in 1985 in the city of Frutal (Switzerland).

It took 120 kg of sugar and 2500 eggs to make it. The record-holder meringue length was more than 100 meters, and the weight was over 200 kg. To bake it, a separate oven was built, and such a meringue was served with 80 liters of confectionery cream (which one is not reported). Professional chefs use a hand whisk to achieve the maximum air mass, and beat the foam with scooping (and not smearing) movements, trying to rake as much air as possible. Thus, the foam is abundantly filled with bubbles, giving it lightness and airiness.