Today’s guest post is from celebrated foodie, Gloria Kobrin-married 42 years, Mother of two, Grandmother of two. Gloria has cooked her whole life for groups ranging from four to 100. Gloria specializes in creating delicious gourmet food that is approachable to the home cook and that also happens to be Kosher. Gloria is the author of the Kosher Cookbook App for iPhone and iPad and has just launched her new website: www.kosherbygloria.com.
Gloria shares her recipes and cooking tips on her Kosher Cookbook page on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/KosherCookbookApp, on Twitter.com/Koshercookbook as well as on Instagram and on Pinterest.
Here’s what Gloria has to say: While the weather outside might be freezing in New York City these days, spring is almost upon us. If the weather won’t agree, at least we should be able to bring a bit of the garden to our tabletops…
Meringue Mushrooms
Yield: about 60 cookies (30 mushrooms)
There is definitely a WOW factor when you present this dessert.
Ingredients
- Whites of 6 large eggs-room temperature
- 1 ½ cups superfine sugar
- Small pinch of salt
- 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa
Equipment
- Electric blender with whisk attachment inserted
- 2 large cookie sheets lined with baking parchment
- Piping bag with round tip
- Sharp knife
- Sieve with very small holes
Instructions:
- Pour egg whites into bowl of mixer. Turn the mixer on low and begin to beat the whites. When they begin to look foamy, add pinch of salt. Raise the mixer to medium-high speed. As the whites begin to take shape, add 1 cup of sugar while beating constantly. Beat for one or two minutes. As the mixture starts to become stiff and shiny, add remaining ½ cup sugar and continue to beat whites until meringue forms stiff peaks that retain their shape. You should be able to hold the bowl upside down and not have the egg whites fall out.
- Preheat oven to: 180 F.
- You need to create the button tops and stems of the mushrooms separately. After they bake (dry out), you will attach them to form mushrooms.
To form tops and stems: Fill the piping bag half full with meringue. Gently squeeze air out of the bag and squeeze round circles on to the parchment. You can place them right next to each other. Meringues don’t spread. Use half the meringue mixture to pipe the tops and the other half to pipe two inch long stems. When you’re done, the tops might have small peaks on their tops. You can pat them down lightly with your finger or the back of a rubber spatula.
- Place cookie sheets on bottom and middle level of the oven. Bake for about 75 minutes. My personal preference is to have snow white meringues; but if they begin to take on some color it doesn’t affect their taste. Turn off the oven and leave the meringues inside overnight.
- Carefully remove tops and stems from the cookie sheets. Using the tip of a sharp knife, gently create small holes in the bottoms of the meringue tops. Insert a stem into each crevice. You probably will have to dig out a little more or less in each meringue top. Once you have created your mushrooms, you can arrange them in a basket or serving dish. Pour cocoa into sieve and shake it over the tops of the meringue mushrooms to simulate dirt.
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