Monday, June 1, 2009

Rant/Rave - I Thought This Was Supposed To Be Easy

Monday, June 1, 2009
So I think I mentioned awhile back that I planned to take on Omnomicon's recipe for lemon meringue cupcakes. If you actually just went to the link - you will see how cute hers are. They are like little golden caps atop some sort of helpful forest friend whose mom is an acorn and dad is a pine marten. Well mine didn't turn out so well:

These are kind of a three part deal where you make each element and then stack it all together like a Napoleon. The cake part was simple enough, but didn't really rise at all. It did come out nice and spongy and made for a good base - but I would recommend doubling the cake batter part of the recipe.

The second part is the lemon curd, which was easy, and which turned out very nicely, and which made a return appearance in my kitchen this weekend when I had to make a layered birthday cake on short notice.

But it was part three, the meringue part, that seemed to do me in. I am still not sure where it went wrong. My stiff peaks seemed fine:


And I somewhat carefully traced the shape of the cupcake liners onto the wax paper before plopping down the meringue mixture:


But as soon as I pulled them out of the oven, they went from puffy and light golden to sticky shriveled messes in a matter of seconds. Up until that point the only meringue I ever made was on top of a pie and not baked separately, so I wonder if the baking sheet had something to do with it or what. I think I read somewhere you are supposed to leave your oven door open when making meringues so maybe that was it. Whatever the case, they still tasted okay but will definitely not be a go to recipe for me. That is, unless, I get some meringue coaching.

Oh my friend took these pictures which is why they are so, so much better than the ones I usually post.

2 comments:

Wendell said...

I have never tried baking meringue separately either. I wonder if the humidity was too high?

jessirene said...

you need stiffer peaks! pump more air in there and they will stay tighter in the oven. i can't imagine these adorable treats are very easy to eat.

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