Peppermint meringues
Since Thanksgiving I’ve been thinking about peppermint. Dreaming about peppermint. I wanted to find a holiday recipe highlighting the flavor, so I started searching. I looked at mousse recipes, hot cocoa recipes, brownie recipes, smoothie recipes; pretty much any peppermint-containing recipe you can think of. Then nearly by accident I found this simple idea: peppermint meringues from Taste of Home. And I remembered the aquafaba meringues I made back in school. Tada! Blog-friendly recipe found.
I decided to make my meringues unflavored, like in the Taste of Home version, and let the peppermint candy do the flavoring, so I followed this simple combination of the two recipes:
Ingredients:
Aquafaba from 1 can chickpeas (~15 oz can)
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons safe powdered sugar
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
2 regular-sized peppermint candy canes, red and green, crushed* (OR add a few drops of peppermint extract to the meringues and sprinkle with colored sugar instead of crushed candy canes)
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 212F. Line 2 or more baking sheets with parchment paper.
Add aquafaba to a large, clean bowl and beat on high speed for about 5 minutes.
While continuing to beat, gradually add powdered sugar. Once sugar has been incorporated, add the cream of tartar (and flavoring if using).
Continue beating until mixture is glossy and very stiff peaks form.
Drop teaspoonfuls or scoop mixture into pastry bag and pipe desired shapes onto baking sheets. (Or use a sandwich bag with the corner cut off as a simple way to ‘pipe’ your meringues.)
Sprinkle with crushed candy cane pieces.
Bake for 2 hours and 45 minutes, then turn off oven and leave meringues in warm oven for another hour.
Meringues are done when completely dry and not sticky, but not browned.
Store immediately in an airtight container in the fridge.
Makes about 4 dozen (48) teaspoon-sized meringues.
The meringues I made using this recipe are cute and holiday-ish and clearly homemade-looking, since I don’t have a pastry bag. And they taste pretty good, too…but they didn’t have enough peppermint flavor to suit me. I also found the pieces of candy left after the meringue melted to be odd tasting, but that may be because I bought cheap candy canes. In the future I think I’ll skip the candy and flavor the meringues with peppermint extract instead, then sprinkle with colored sugar for a festive look!
*Finding candy that’s not sweetened with corn syrup is a challenge these days, but for those with a corn allergy it’s critical. A quick search online provides a few sources, such as Wholesome and YumEarth. Using peppermint extract and colored sugar is another corn-free option.