Skip to main content
Dessert

Peach Meringue

A dessert of sliced peaches topped with a glossy meringue and baked until lightly browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Peach Meringue

Why it works: Peach and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,308 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Peach Meringue

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the fruit

  1. Slice the peaches and place them in the bottom of a dish.

  2. Sprinkle the peaches with sugar.

Make the meringue

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  2. Gradually add ¾ cup sugar to the egg whites, continuing to beat until glossy.

Bake and serve

  1. Spread the meringue over the peaches.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for a few minutes until lightly browned.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Peach + eggtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,048 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Peaches
Provide the fruit base and moisture that softens under the meringue.
Egg whites
Whipped into a foam that gives the meringue its airy structure and volume.
Sugar
Sweetens the dish and helps stabilise the whipped egg white foam to make it glossy.

The step that matters

Beating the meringue to stiff, glossy peaks. Egg whites must be whipped until they hold stiff peaks; under-whipped whites collapse and weaken the meringue. Adding sugar gradually helps dissolve it and stabilises the foam, giving a glossy, stable topping.

Swap the peach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More peach meringue recipes

Pie 12Apple and Pie 5Apple Pie 5Pudding 4Apple or Pie 3 See all 41 →

You might also like

Peach Ice CreamPeach Ice Cream64 recipesPeach FrittersPeach Fritters55 recipesPeach IcePeach Ice16 recipesDried Peach PuddingDried Peach Pudding14 recipes