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It had taken me a while to finally find our ideal recipe for pavlova and how best to use our rental oven to achieve a good evenly cooked pavlova and as a result, hubby has requested that i record what i did because he really liked this year's version.
I have found that using icing sugar rather than caster sugar works better because you want the sugar to dissolve as quickly as possible into the egg whites and icing sugar does this nicely.
So here it is, my recipe and my solution for our oven (that bit is quite important btw. each oven varies. Mine has numerous combinations between top/bottom/both elements on and every variation with or without the fan. Typically if I use the bottom element, no matter what I do, the bottom cooks much faster than the top. I can add a shield, add foil, move the shelf to the very top of the oven, but the bottom of everything including my meringue will overcook before the top is even vaguely cooked... so my solution is to use the top element only with the shelf in the middle of the oven. It is what works for me currently at this rental property. You'll have to experiment or know your oven already.
Ingredients
6-7 egg whites (if smaller eggs go with 7), roughly 200g of egg white (30-35g per egg)
330g icing sugar
1 tsp white (clear) vinegar plus extra for cleaning
1½ tbsp cornflour (UK terminology in use)
1 tsp best vanilla paste/essence
Method
For us, this was the perfect pavlova.
I have found that using icing sugar rather than caster sugar works better because you want the sugar to dissolve as quickly as possible into the egg whites and icing sugar does this nicely.
So here it is, my recipe and my solution for our oven (that bit is quite important btw. each oven varies. Mine has numerous combinations between top/bottom/both elements on and every variation with or without the fan. Typically if I use the bottom element, no matter what I do, the bottom cooks much faster than the top. I can add a shield, add foil, move the shelf to the very top of the oven, but the bottom of everything including my meringue will overcook before the top is even vaguely cooked... so my solution is to use the top element only with the shelf in the middle of the oven. It is what works for me currently at this rental property. You'll have to experiment or know your oven already.
Ingredients
6-7 egg whites (if smaller eggs go with 7), roughly 200g of egg white (30-35g per egg)
330g icing sugar
1 tsp white (clear) vinegar plus extra for cleaning
1½ tbsp cornflour (UK terminology in use)
1 tsp best vanilla paste/essence
Method
- It is vitally important that your bowl and implements are very clean and as such washed out with white vinegar and allowed to dry first. Include the balloon whisk in your cleaning.
- The egg whites need to be at room temperature, so get them out the night before if you keep your eggs in the fridge.
- Heat the oven to 120°C. I need to use the top element only, on or around the middle shelf in the oven.
- I don't preheat my baking tray, but you do need to score a 23cm diameter circle onto baking parchment so that you have a shape to fill.
- Sieve the icing sugar and cornflour together in another clean bowl so that it is ready later on.
- Now whisk the egg whites with a balloon whisk until they are soft peaks, not hard peaks. I found that whisking at a lower speed for longer gives a much better meringue than whisking at maximum speed. You need to be careful not to overwhisk the whites later on and hard peaks as this stage will cause problems later.
- Gently whisk in the white vinegar next.
- Followed by the icing sugar/cornflour mix.
- And finally whisk in the vanilla paste. You should now have a lovely glossy meringue mixture that will hold its shape and not settle.
- Now quickly spoon (again very clean) the mixture into the score circle, starting with the circumference and filling in the inside afterwards. You should make it 2 storeys high. Spoon the 2nd layer onto the joints of the first, overlapping like brickwork. If you have any left, fill in the middle on the 2nd layer but don't worry if you haven't. The fruit needs to go somewhere!
- Put into the oven immediately. Drop to 100°C if it is a fan oven (mine is and was in use) and cook for 1-1½hrs. You'll have a reasonably good idea just by looks. Evenly browning top and bottom.
- Turn off the oven and leave the door slightly open (I have to wedge a spoon handle into the drop down door to keep it open) and leave well alone until total cold.
For us, this was the perfect pavlova.
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