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Meringues (For Pies Puddings and Desserts)
For Pies, Puddings, and Desserts Eggs for meringues should be thoroughly chilled, and beaten with silver fork, wire spoon, or whisk. Where several eggs are needed, much time is saved by using a whisk. Meringues on pies, puddings, or desserts may be spread evenly, spread and piled in the centre, put on lightly by spoonfuls, or spread evenly with part of the mixture, the remainder being forced through a pastry bag and tube. Meringues I and III should be baked fifteen minutes in slow oven. Meringue II should be cooked eight minutes in moderate oven; if removed from oven before cooked, the eggs will liquefy and meringue settle; if cooked too long, meringue is tough.
Whites 2 eggs Meringue I 1½ tablespoon lemon juice or ¼ teaspoon vanilla 2 tablespoons powdered sugar Beat whites until stiff, add sugar gradually and continue beating, then add flavoring.
Whites 3 eggs
A set of general directions for soft meringue toppings, followed by the first of three formulas. The oven words are the important part: "slow" and "moderate" here mean specific temperatures.
- Oven temperaturesA slow oven is roughly 300F and a moderate oven roughly 350F, though period usage varied. The longer bake in the cooler oven dries and sets the meringue through; the eight-minute bake in the hotter one browns it faster and is less forgiving of a minute either way.
- Powdered sugarIn this period "powdered sugar" meant a fine-milled granulated sugar, not the cornstarch-cut confectioners' sugar sold under that name today. Superfine or caster sugar is the closer match; confectioners' sugar will work but gives a softer, slightly starchy meringue.
- Chilled eggsThe recipe calls for thoroughly chilled whites but gives no reason for it. Modern practice runs the other way: whites at room temperature whip faster and to greater volume, so separate them cold and let them stand about twenty minutes.
- The bowl and the beaterSilver and wire utensils are specified, possibly because tinned or iron ones could discolour the whites, though the book does not say so. Any stainless, glass or copper bowl is fine; avoid plastic, which holds fat and keeps whites from rising. Not a trace of yolk should get in.
- Sugar quantityTwo tablespoons of sugar to two whites is a very lean meringue by modern standards, where two tablespoons per white is common. It tastes of egg rather than candy, which suits a sweet pie filling underneath.
- The hinge: neither under nor overThe warning about liquefying is the whole trick. An underbaked soft meringue seeps and slides off the filling; an overbaked one turns leathery and beads with syrup. Spread it onto filling that is still warm and seal it right up to the pastry rim so no gap forms as it cools.
- Egg safetyA soft meringue baked eight to fifteen minutes does not necessarily reach 160F at the centre. If raw eggs are a concern in your household, use pasteurised whites or a cooked meringue in which hot syrup is beaten into the whites.
- YieldTwo whites make a modest layer on a standard pie. For a deep pie or a high piped finish, the formula that follows begins with three whites.
Soft meringue as a pie topping belongs to the era when custard and lemon fillings took the yolks, and the whites had to go somewhere useful, so they went on top. The directions here are characteristic of the Boston Cooking-School method, which taught technique in graded formulas rather than as single dishes, so a cook learned one set of principles about beating, spreading and baking whites and then chose among Meringues I, II and III according to the dessert. The mention of a silver fork or wire whisk dates the page as precisely as any oven temperature, the recipe itself noting that "much time is saved by using a whisk."