Healthy & Delicious: Meringue Cookies
Editor's note: On Mondays, Kristen Swensson of Cheap, Healthy, Good swings by these parts to share healthy and delicious recipes with us. Take it away, Kristen!
[Photograph: Kristen Swensson]
Every year, my Ma sets aside one December day to bake Christmas cookies. In 12 short hours, she produces dozens upon dozens of almond crescents, pinwheels, rum balls, pfeffernusse, and the holy grail of holiday treats: peanut butter and jelly bars. Once she's finished, she passes out on the couch, leaving the family to descend upon the kitchen like so many sugar-starved cookie vultures. It's never the healthiest of evenings, but hell if it ain't one of the best.
So, I'll be the first to admit: substituting low-cal Christmas cookies for the real thing is morally akin to stabbing Santa with a rusty fork. What's nice about meringue cookies, though, is they're not supposed to replace anything. Instead, they're intended as delightfully airy add-ons to your standard cookie cache. The calorie count (10 to 15 per meringue) is completely incidental.
Other nice things about meringue cookies: the entire batch costs under a dollar, each serving is totally fat-free, and the flavor can be customized to whatever extract you have on hand. (Here, it's peppermint). Plus, they're feather-light and undeniably cute.
If you decide to make them yourself, know that excess humidity and/or underbeating the batter may result in flat cookies. Additionally, your mileage may vary on the number of servings. My batch yielded 44 medium-ish meringues, but anywhere between 30 and 50 sounds reasonable.
Here's looking at you, Christmas cookies. Whatever your calorie content, you'll always have a place in my gastrointestinal system.
Ingredients
serves 30 to 50 cookies
- 2 egg whites
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract (optional)
- 4 drops green food coloring (optional)
Procedures
-
1
Heat oven to 225°F and line two cookie sheets with aluminum foil.
-
2
Using a StandMixer or good hand mixer, beat egg whites, salt, and cream of tartar on medium-high speed until soft peaks form. Slowly add sugar and keep beating until stiff peaks form. (DO NOT underbeat.) If using extract and food coloring, add at the end and beat for another 2 or 3 minutes.
-
3
Spoon mixture into a plastic bag and squeeze out most of the air. Cut off one small corner of the bag and pipe cookie-sized dollops of meringue on to cookie sheets, about 1 inch apart. (If done correctly, the cookies will stay in those exact shapes when finished.)
10 comments:
Not really along the healthy vein, but I love to make meringue cookies and add crushed candy canes and small chunks of dark chocolate before baking to make them festive.
Peony at 9:22AM on 11/30/09
My friend's mom always baked her meringue cookies on brown paper bags from the grocery store. She swore they prevented her cookies from browning. Wow, probably not the safest method of baking. Maybe I should be thankful that I lived to tell this tale...
takiyaki at 12:18PM on 11/30/09
Joythebaker.com added a stripe of red food coloring (I think it was a paste) up the side of the bag in a few places, it made stripes on the meringues - very pretty! I will try these this year!
itsworthalook at 5:46PM on 11/30/09
I love meringue cookies, and I've never tried to make them myself because I've heard that meringue is difficult to handle. I may just give it a try some time soon. The ingredients cost next to nothing, so I really don't have much to lose.
sandn8r9 at 2:49AM on 12/02/09
Watch out for peppermint extract...mine had oil of peppermint in it, and caused my whole batch to go floppy :( Stupid fats in egg whites.
lesliev at 3:00AM on 12/07/09
I learned that to get good meringue cookies, just beat the hell out of the egg whites.
ReneeC at 3:01PM on 12/09/09
how long do these keep? can they be frozen?
FoodStuffs at 1:49PM on 12/13/09
Hi Foodstuffs - they keep a few days in an airtight container. (Moisture is their enemy.) Not sure about the freezer, but I would think no, since they're very dependent on remaining dry.
Kristen Swensson at 2:04PM on 12/13/09
Thanks Kristen!
FoodStuffs at 2:16PM on 12/13/09
Finally made these! Didn't use food coloring, and they look like snowman turds.
I used vanilla extract instead of peppermint (mine had peppermint oil in it), and I think I overcooked them as they browned a little. Still good though, they taste like toasted marshmallows.
Thanks for the recipe! So easy!
FoodStuffs at 12:05PM on 12/21/09