Easy Meringue Recipe! A Gluten free, Dairy free, nut free cookie!

I figured I might as well add one of my favorite recipes! 

This cookie is the super cookie! Being gluten, dairy, and nut free it is edible for even the most sensitive stomach! The best part is these cookies taste absolutely amazing and have endless possibilities! Whether you want a Chai meringue to a raspberry lemonade one this recipe can help! While some may say that Meringues are difficult I have proof that anyone can make them as long as they have the ingredients and a hand mixer! But wait it gets better, meringues are a low fat food! 

A bit about meringues

Meringues are delicate little cookies of egg whites, sugar, and magic. In the 1600's Lady Rachel Fane published a manuscript of collected recipes calling these delicate cookies "pets" which translated from French to English means "farts". The reason behind the naming is the cookies Light and fluffy texture. Meringues are still called Pets in the Loire region of France to this day. 

The meringues were originally shaped with two spoons but Antonin Carême introduced the idea of using a piping bag.  Now there are three types of meringue, the meringue I will be focusing on and cooking is the French meringue. Growing up meringues were my favorite cookie, they were so light and just melted in my mouth. My goal was to learn to cook meringues and thanks to my grandma we have found the easiest way to do so!

  

Dropped using bag technique

Dropped using spoon technique

Peppermint meringue with dark chocolate ganache 

Blissful Meringue Recipe

This meringue recipe is as comforting as a cinnamon roll on a cold afternoon. A great winter treat to finish off a dinner.  

Prep time: 30 minutes 

Bake time: 2 hours

Ingredients: 

2 large eggs at room temp (if fresh out of fridge put them in a bowl of warm water) 

2/3 cup of ultra fine sugar (fine sugar works as well) 

1/4 tsp cream of tartar 

1 tsp vanilla 

1/4 -1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon

Tools: 

Hand Mixer

Spatula (great tool to get all the batter out of the bowl) 

Cookie Sheet

Wax/parchment paper 

Piping Bag 

Steps: 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

2. When eggs are at room temperature crack and separate the egg whites, we only want the egg whites so make sure the yoke does not break! If you are new to this I recommend having an extra bowl at hand to do this separately so you can pick out any egg shells if any fall in. 

3. When egg whites are separated pour them into your mixing bowl and mix until they are foamy. You can whisk them yourself but I highly recommend using a hand mixer if you want to prevent your arms from getting too sore! Hand mixing this dough is incredibly difficult and requires a lot of patience. 

I got an amazing Kitchen Aid Hand Mixer last year that I adore, It has five speeds and works wonders. If you want to stock your kitchen with the right type of cooking tools I highly recommend searching online for them. You are able to get great deals and have it shipped directly to your home. 

If you are on the search for a hand mixer below is a link that takes you to a great one I found on Amazon. 

Oster 2500 Inspire 240-Watt 5-Speed Hand Mixer

4. Once Egg whites are foamy put 1/4 teaspoon of your cream of tartar into the whites and continue to mix until you no longer see the cream of tartar in the batter. Pay attention though you do not want to over mix this step!

5. When the cream of tartar is mixed in slowly begin to pour in your sugar. Once you have half of your sugar mixed in pour in your vanilla and cinnamon. After this continue slowly pouring in your sugar. 

6. Mix the meringue until you have a nice consistency that causes the batter to stand in peaks when you take the beaters out of it. If you have excess batter on the beaters turn to a low speed in the bowl above the batter to get rid of the excess. 

7. Time to put the meringues on the cookie sheet! Lay out a line of parchment paper on your cookie sheet. If you are short on time and only have wax paper that works as well but can leave wax on your cookie sheets. Recently I found a reusable cookie sheet liner that works great with these cookies and others. It makes the job of cleaning up so much easier! I found the cheapest place to buy them is online, below is a link to a great product on Amazon.com!

Regency Reusable Cookie Sheet Liner

8. When it comes to dropping the cookies onto the sheet there are two ways that you can do so. As stated before there is the spoon method, and with that you will end up having the imperfect mountain looking meringues. To do meringues like this you take one spoon and scoop up some of the batter, and when you are in place on the cookie sheet you take another spoon and scoop the batter out of the first one.

You can also use the piping bag method! Personally I prefer this method due to the fact that it ensures evenly sized meringues which gives you a much better chance of them all turning out right. 

If you do not have a piping bag but have plastic bags you can always scoop some batter into the bag and once it is full cut the tip of the bag off and use that as a piping bag. I recently got an amazing decorator that I use for piping out the meringues. This is a great tool to have if you are going to be decorating a lot of cakes or making a lot of meringues. Its easy to use and doesn't make as much of a mess as piping bags can. 

My handsome assistant using the new decorator

The meringues before being put into the oven

Make sure that when you put the meringues on the cookie sheet you leave enough space between them, meringues do expand a bit and if they are touching their neighbors they are stuck unless you want to ruin both cookies in pulling them apart!

9. Now put those cookies in the oven, close the door then turn the oven off. Do not let anyone open that oven door or else the heat will escape and you will end up with uncooked meringues. Let the cookies sit in the oven for two hours. Once two hours have passed take them out and let them sit for five minutes.

10. Enjoy!

Be very careful taking the cookies off the sheet, they are very fragile!

Hope you enjoyed my recipe!

Please comment and post pictures if you tried it, and if you have any questions feel free to ask!