How to Make a Pavlova

hi everyone today we're going to make a pavlova which is a meringue dessert that has a really soft marshmallow inside and a crisp exterior French meringue is what we're going to start with our training differs from Italian Swiss meringues which have heat applied to the egg whites during the whipping process a French meringue is simply raw egg whites beaten with sugar to stiff peaks so we're going to start with four egg whites I separated these when they were cold and I let them come to room temperature for about an hour so we're gonna pour them into the bowl here the reason you want room-temperature egg whites is because they will whip up with more volume and a little faster than cold egg whites and I'm gonna add just a pinch of salt to these this is just gonna help the meringue to be a little bit more stable and we're gonna just start on the medium-low speed medial is important when you're starting to with your meringues because air bubbles will be a lot smaller when they're forming in here and that will also contribute to a more stable marine so this process is going to take about five to six minutes just be patient okay so now you can start to see that there's some air bubbles forming in the bowl but the egg whites have not turned white yet so it's quite a ways to go before we're ready to start adding the sugar okay so this is not quite done well we're gonna have to show everybody you want you to see that there's a lot of really small bubbles in this bowl and the mixture is starting to lighten in color so he risk is starting to leave a very distinct trail and the meringue mixture here this is a perfect time to start adding the superfine sugar we're gonna do it very gradually you'll be cut up we want to give that sugar enough time to dissolve in between the sperm adding about a tablespoon at a time

we're just gonna let that beat for a little bit but I'm gonna turn this up to medium we're gonna all the sugar is resolved in the mixer and this is where you're really gonna see that volume we're gonna so what I'm gonna do now is turn off the mixer I'm gonna scrape down the sides of the bowl because there are quite a few sugar crystals still almost hugging the bowl from Florine it in and undissolved sugar is the enemy of a pavlova now's the time to turn it up to medium high and we're gonna beat this until stiff glossy peaks form it's gonna take another five to six minutes maybe a little bit longer depending on your mixer

it's really thick it's glossy and bright white and it holds a stiff peak here okay the last step of the mixing process for this pavlova is to make a slurry of corn syrup vinegar and vanilla paste the cornstarch and vinegar will combine to give us that really soft pillowy marshmallowy interior that is characteristic and necessary in a pavlova I'm just mixing these two together here I found during recipe testing that this slurry incorporates better than just adding the ingredients separately we're just gonna turn the mixer back on for just a few seconds onto a medium high speed just to get this integrated

okay so I've whisked the cornstarch vanilla and vinegar in on the mixer but I'm just gonna do one final fold because there's a little bit stuck on the side and I want that all mixed in you do want to be gentle you really don't want to deflate this but a couple folds will be alright one test you can do with your meringue make sure to make sure that all your sugars dissolved is just take a little bit in between your fingers and rub it together you shouldn't feel any grains of sugar in there you do it needs to be whipped longer do not want any undissolved sugar and you have a lot more you can get some weeping on it at when it's baking now we get to form the pavlova but I'm gonna do here is just get all of this mixture onto this parchment paper and I have traced a circle you can really trace any sized circle you like I like a 7 to 8 inch circle because that will give you a thicker pavlova which means more marshmallow be Center and we're just gonna start moving this out into a circular shape and it's probably gonna extend a little bit beyond the outline of trace we're just fine and the squirrels and the peaks and all that is the best part of the pavlova it makes it really beautiful when it comes out of the oven so one thing you want to do is just start taking your spatula and just moving this around and pushing that out to the outside because you want to have a nice little divot in the center where you're gonna fill your whip cream and your berries or whatever topping that you've chosen for your pavlova but embrace the imperfections okay and then you can just make designs you can swirl you can make Peaks by doing that with your offset spatula can really do anything you like here

eventually you're gonna have to decide to call it get though okay this is done what we're gonna do now is put this in a 200 degree oven for about two to two and a quarter hours when it's done the outside will be very crisp then we're going to let it cool in the oven that is turned off that's very important to those our pavlova has finished baking low and slow in the oven and how you can tell it's done is it's very crisp on the outside shell here I'm going to tap it with a spoon just so you can hear how crisp it is and don't worry if your pavlova cracks at all maryberry says that that is perfectly fine and add to the term of it so don't worry about things like that we're gonna cover it with whipped cream berries and this should peel up very easily here okay and then I'm just gonna break it open like that little messy but that's the fun of the pavlova and you can see here there's a nice marshmallowy interior and then it's a nice crisp shell and you'll get a little bit of chew here where the marshmallow meets the crisp exterior and that's one of the best parts a lot of the taste testers really love that part of them have a lot of those so I hope you make this and enjoy it just as much as we did and top it with whatever you like thank you