December 3, 2012
Mignardise
meringues
(meringues)
Beat some egg whites together with some sugar. Form into shapes and dry them in a warm oven. What could be simpler? Maybe that’s why meringues have been around for a long time.
It may be that the earliest recipe for a meringue, at least in the form of a cookie, can be found in the notes of Lady Elinor Fettiplace. Her manuscript in a leather-bound book is simply inscribed with her name and the date of 1604. It is assumed that all the recipes are in her hand. The cookies are yet to be called meringues, that would happen in France almost 90 years later. Her recipe is
To make white bisket bread
Take a pound & a half of sugar, & an handfull of fine white flower, the whites of twelve eggs, beaten verie finelie, and a little annisseed brused, temper all this together, till it bee no thicker than pap, make coffins with paper, and put it into the oven, after the manchet is drawen. [1]
Almost fifty years later in 1653 in Le Pastissier françois, La Varenne presents a recipe for biscuits de sucre en neige which also resembles our modern meringue cookie recipes. Here is a modern translation of the recipe
Snow-Sugar Biscuits
Clarify a quarter pound of royal sugar and cook it to the consistency of a very thick syrup or of rose sugar. Then into that add two egg whites, whipped to a mousse, beat everything together and spread it out on paper in the form of little biscuits. Give them a very gentle oven. [2]
The affixing of the name meringue happens 1692 in François Massialot’s Le Nouveau cuisinier royal et bourgeois ou Cuisinier moderne. There’s at least four standard meringue recipes in the book as well as some that are more like modern macaroons. Here’s the plainest meringue recipe from the 1702 English translation of the book
To that purpose, take three or four new-laid Eggs, according to the quantity of Meringues requir’d to be made; reserve the Whites, and whip them till they form a rocky Snow. Then you are to put to them a little green Lemmon grated, with three or four spoonfuls of fine Sugar pass’d thro’ the Sieve, and let all be whipt together ; a little prepar’d Amber may also be added : Afterwards take some white Paper, and with a Spoon make your Meringues of a round or oval Figure, accordingly as you shall think fit, about the thickness of a walnut ; leaving some Distance between every one of them : In the mean while, let some powder’d Sugar be put into the end of a Napkin, and strew the Meringues with it. On the same Table, where they are dress’d may be laid the cover of a Campain-oven, that has not been put into the Fire, but only has had some Fire upon it, and the meringues may be cover’d with it, to give them a kind of Ash-colour ; but no Fire must be put underneath : When they are bak’d and well ic’d, let them be taken off the Paper. You may also put in a little Fruit, as a Rasberry, Strawberry or Cherry, according to the Season, and joyn other Meringues to them, to make Twins. [3]
Comments like whisking the egg whites in a copper bowl or adding a pinch cream of tartar to make the egg foam more stable don’t appear in these early recipes. I wonder how stiff their meringues were before baking since they were probably still using whisks fashioned out of a handful of twigs.
My recipe is adapted from Jacques Torres’ Dessert Circus at Home [4]. I originally started using this recipe, years ago, because of its simplicity. Even with the small quantity of ingredients listed below, I always produce more than a quart container of finished meringues. Luckily, they are quite shelf stable.
30 g (2 T), about 1
extra-large egg white
30 g (2-1⁄2 T)
granulated sugar
30 g (4 T)
powdered sugar
1. Preheat oven to 95 °C (200 °F). Prepare a rimmed baking sheet with a silicone-pan liner.
2. Place the egg white in a bowl, and whisk using a stand mixer set to high. When the white become opaque, slowly add the granulated sugar. Continue whisking until stiff, but not dry, peaks form. Turn speed to low, and continue whisking for 2 more minutes.
3. Sift the powdered sugar into the white, and fold by hand carefully to combine.
4. Place the egg-white mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a 6-mm (1⁄4-in) star tip. Pipe 2-1⁄2 cm (1-in) round mounds onto the prepared baking sheet.
5. Bake the meringues for 2 to 2-1⁄2 hours until dry. Cool before storing.
[1] Hilary Spurling, Elinor Fettiplace’s Receipt Book. London: The Salamander Press, 1986, pg. 118.
[2] Terence Scully, La Verenne’s Cookery: The French Cook; The French Pastry Chef; The French Confectioner. Blackawton (UK): Prospect Books, 2006, pg. 456.
[3] François Massialot. The court and country cook : giving new and plain directions how to order all manner of entertainments, And the best sort of the Most exquisite a-la-mode Ragoo’s. Together with new instructions for confectioners : Shewing How to Preserve all sorts of Fruits, as well dry as liquid: Also, How to make divers Sugar-Works, and other sine Pieces of Curiosity; How to set out a Desert, or Banquet of Sweet-Meats to the best advantage; And, How to prepare several sorts of liquors, that are proper for every Season of the Year. A Work more especially necessary for Stewards, Clerks of the Kitchen, Confectioners, Butlers, and other Officers, and also of great use in private Families. Faithfully translated out of French into English by J.K. London: Printed by W. Onley, for A. and F. Churchill and M. Gillyflower, 1702, pg. 154.
[4] Jacques Torres, Dessert Circus at Home. New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1999, pg. 81.
© 2012 Peter Hertzmann. All rights reserved.