Skip to main content

Cherry Meringues with Rhubarb Coulis

Master the art of how to make meringues with Michel Roux Snr.

By bbcfood · From Open Recipes · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Rhubarb and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and 276 recipes mention both. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 4
Prep30 min

Ingredients

Contains: egg (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Preheat the oven to 100°C (210°F) and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

  2. Pit the cherries. Put them in a small pan with the 150g/5oz caster sugar, the bay leaves, the thyme sprigs and a splash of water. Simmer gently for 10 minutes until syrupy, then remove the herbs and set the cherries aside.

  3. Split the vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape out the seeds. Trim and chop the rhubarb, then cook it with 100g/3¾oz caster sugar, the seeds and the pod for 8 to 10 minutes until soft.

  4. Remove the vanilla pod, blend the rhubarb until smooth, pass it through a sieve and let it cool to make the coulis.

  5. Whisk the egg whites until soft peaks form. Gradually add the 90g/3½oz caster sugar, whisking until the mixture is glossy and holds stiff peaks.

  6. Sift the icing sugar and fold it gently into the meringue with a spatula, keeping as much air in the mixture as possible.

  7. Spoon the meringue into four mounds on the lined sheet and press a shallow hollow into the centre of each.

  8. Bake for about 1 hour 30 minutes until the outsides are crisp and dry to the touch. Turn off the oven and leave the meringues inside with the door ajar to cool for 30 minutes.

  9. Fill the hollows of the meringues with the cherries, spoon the rhubarb coulis around them and serve.

By bbcfood. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Rhubarb + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together276 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together35,031 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + eggtop 10% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together122,252 recipes

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

  4. Thyme + rhubarbtop 11% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together16 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Sugar + rhubarbtop 11% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together1,852 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Sugar and vanilla share little aroma chemistry, yet 35,031 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Flavor stand-ins for the thyme

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

  1. Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
  2. Nutmegbetter flavor fit
  3. Gingerbetter flavor fit
  4. Thymethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, rhubarb, vanilla. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).