I want to start out with some quick, pastry-related bragging, before I get on to the main event.
Oh, heeeey gluten-free scones, how YOU doin'? ;)
Observe, admire, fawn over these glutenless goodies.
Awesome. Thanks for participating! Now, on to the newest project: holiday-theme cooking.
I'm typically a total holiday buzzkill. The weather always sucks (winter = cold = awful), Thanksgiving just makes me sleepy (damn you, tryptophan!), Christmas music is seizure-inducing, and electronic singing Valentines make me want to kill someone with a ninja star
But there is one holiday that I can get on board with. HALLOWEEN!!!
Halloween is far superior to every other holiday. Ghosts and skeletons and dismembered body parts are a million times cooler than Rudolphs and Albuquerque Turkey (remember that song?!). Hocus Pocus trumps The Santa Clause. And think about it! Would The Nightmare Before Christmas be any good if it weren't set in Halloweentown?
I think I've made my point.
Anyway, this post's adventure is about baking ridiculously adorable ghost-shaped meringues (mereangs? mirenges?).
YES. YOU READ THAT CORRECTLY. GHOST MERINGUES.
Please try to contain your excitement. And for the rest of this entry, let's pretend that I'm baking these cutesy cookies for my "brother's kids". Because Casper-shaped desserts probably shouldn't make a 20-something grad student THIS excited.
Meringue is basically just whipped egg whites. Actually, that's exactly what it is. There's only 4 ingredients, hence, it should be the easiest thing in the world to make.
Aaaaaaaaaaaand then I enter the picture.
The only 2 things I lacked were enough egg whites, and mini chocolate chips for the eyes. Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy! I didn't want to waste 9 whole eggs just for the whites, and I normally buy those cartons of egg whites anyway, so I made a quick grocery run.
Of course, liquid egg whites were the only thing in the entire friggin store that hadn't been re-stocked today. Just imagine that long, florescent-lit aisle, packed to the brim with every dairy and imitation dairy item known to man, and one tiny little ironic empty space where my product should have been.
I wish I'd gotten a picture of it.
Oookay, so, no egg whites. I figured I could at least get the mini chips. So I skipped on over to the baking needs aisle.
Not a bag of mini chips in sight.
They had 60% cacao dark bittersweet chips, caramel morsels, peanut butter chips, white chocolate morsels. SERIOUSLY, how many flavors of chips does our culture really need?!? Also, what's the deal with the "morsels"? Personally, I think a morsel sounds smaller than a chip. It sounds downright microscopic. But nope, morsels are just Hershey's way of pretending they are special.
Get over yourself, Hershey.
Anyway, ghost meringues without eyes = weird meringue blobs. That simply will not do. So I settled for a bag of miniature Hershey kisses ("my brother's kids" hate milk chocolate, but desperate times...) Then I traipsed alllllll the way to Trader Joes (about 0.3 miles farther than Shaws) to get the carton of egg whites. I am such a dedicated aunt.
Back at home, after successfully completing those gorgeous gluten-free scones, I moved on to the meringues. I whipped 9 eggs' worth of liquid egg whites for approximately a millennium, after which I had a large bowlful of........very frothy egg whites.
They are supposed to form stiff peaks (heh...stiff peaks) after only a couple minutes! What's the deal, yo?!
I tried several remedies. I chilled the bowl. Nada. I divided it into 2 bowls, thinking maybe it was just too much for my little mixer to handle in one go. Zilch. I added more cream of tartar. Diddly-squat. Eventually, I admitted defeat, and switched to old-fashioned eggs. Of which I only had 5. So the recipe had to be halved.
In summation, while trying not to waste 9 eggs, I managed to waste 5 plus 9 eggs' worth of whites instead. There goes breakfast for a week.
Oh, and did I mention that miniature Hershey kisses are exactly the same size as normal chocolate chips?
At least the final product looks creepy-crawly-spooky-kooky AWESOME, so it was all worth it! "My brother's kids" love them.
Little Meringue Ghosts
5 large egg whites
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup sugar
miniature chocolate chips
1. Heat oven to 200 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. In large bowl, beat egg whites, cream of tartar and vanilla extract with electric mixer on medium speed until soft peaks form. Gradually add sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, beating on high speed until stiff glossy peaks form and sugar is almost dissolved.
3. Spoon half of meringue mixture into large resealable food-storage plastic bag; seal bag. Cut off corner of bag. Squeeze bag to pipe ghost shapes onto cookie sheets. Repeat with remaining meringue. Insert miniature chocolate chips for eyes.
4. Bake for 1 hour. Turn off oven; leave meringues in oven with door closed 8 hours.
From: Pilsbury
Oh, heeeey gluten-free scones, how YOU doin'? ;)
Observe, admire, fawn over these glutenless goodies.
Awesome. Thanks for participating! Now, on to the newest project: holiday-theme cooking.
I'm typically a total holiday buzzkill. The weather always sucks (winter = cold = awful), Thanksgiving just makes me sleepy (damn you, tryptophan!), Christmas music is seizure-inducing, and electronic singing Valentines make me want to kill someone with a ninja star
But there is one holiday that I can get on board with. HALLOWEEN!!!
Halloween is far superior to every other holiday. Ghosts and skeletons and dismembered body parts are a million times cooler than Rudolphs and Albuquerque Turkey (remember that song?!). Hocus Pocus trumps The Santa Clause. And think about it! Would The Nightmare Before Christmas be any good if it weren't set in Halloweentown?
I think I've made my point.
Anyway, this post's adventure is about baking ridiculously adorable ghost-shaped meringues (mereangs? mirenges?).
YES. YOU READ THAT CORRECTLY. GHOST MERINGUES.
Please try to contain your excitement. And for the rest of this entry, let's pretend that I'm baking these cutesy cookies for my "brother's kids". Because Casper-shaped desserts probably shouldn't make a 20-something grad student THIS excited.
Meringue is basically just whipped egg whites. Actually, that's exactly what it is. There's only 4 ingredients, hence, it should be the easiest thing in the world to make.
Aaaaaaaaaaaand then I enter the picture.
The only 2 things I lacked were enough egg whites, and mini chocolate chips for the eyes. Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy! I didn't want to waste 9 whole eggs just for the whites, and I normally buy those cartons of egg whites anyway, so I made a quick grocery run.
Of course, liquid egg whites were the only thing in the entire friggin store that hadn't been re-stocked today. Just imagine that long, florescent-lit aisle, packed to the brim with every dairy and imitation dairy item known to man, and one tiny little ironic empty space where my product should have been.
I wish I'd gotten a picture of it.
Oookay, so, no egg whites. I figured I could at least get the mini chips. So I skipped on over to the baking needs aisle.
Not a bag of mini chips in sight.
They had 60% cacao dark bittersweet chips, caramel morsels, peanut butter chips, white chocolate morsels. SERIOUSLY, how many flavors of chips does our culture really need?!? Also, what's the deal with the "morsels"? Personally, I think a morsel sounds smaller than a chip. It sounds downright microscopic. But nope, morsels are just Hershey's way of pretending they are special.
Get over yourself, Hershey.
Anyway, ghost meringues without eyes = weird meringue blobs. That simply will not do. So I settled for a bag of miniature Hershey kisses ("my brother's kids" hate milk chocolate, but desperate times...) Then I traipsed alllllll the way to Trader Joes (about 0.3 miles farther than Shaws) to get the carton of egg whites. I am such a dedicated aunt.
Back at home, after successfully completing those gorgeous gluten-free scones, I moved on to the meringues. I whipped 9 eggs' worth of liquid egg whites for approximately a millennium, after which I had a large bowlful of........very frothy egg whites.
They are supposed to form stiff peaks (heh...stiff peaks) after only a couple minutes! What's the deal, yo?!
I tried several remedies. I chilled the bowl. Nada. I divided it into 2 bowls, thinking maybe it was just too much for my little mixer to handle in one go. Zilch. I added more cream of tartar. Diddly-squat. Eventually, I admitted defeat, and switched to old-fashioned eggs. Of which I only had 5. So the recipe had to be halved.
In summation, while trying not to waste 9 eggs, I managed to waste 5 plus 9 eggs' worth of whites instead. There goes breakfast for a week.
Oh, and did I mention that miniature Hershey kisses are exactly the same size as normal chocolate chips?
At least the final product looks creepy-crawly-spooky-kooky AWESOME, so it was all worth it! "My brother's kids" love them.
 |
| Getting my revenge on the very-not-miniature Hershey kisses. |
 |
| Nice stiff peaks ;) |
 |
| CUTE AS BUTTONS! |
 | ||||
| Tanning in the nude. |
Little Meringue Ghosts
5 large egg whites
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup sugar
miniature chocolate chips
1. Heat oven to 200 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. In large bowl, beat egg whites, cream of tartar and vanilla extract with electric mixer on medium speed until soft peaks form. Gradually add sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, beating on high speed until stiff glossy peaks form and sugar is almost dissolved.
3. Spoon half of meringue mixture into large resealable food-storage plastic bag; seal bag. Cut off corner of bag. Squeeze bag to pipe ghost shapes onto cookie sheets. Repeat with remaining meringue. Insert miniature chocolate chips for eyes.
4. Bake for 1 hour. Turn off oven; leave meringues in oven with door closed 8 hours.
From: Pilsbury
