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Dessert

Blackberry Meringue

A baked meringue topped with blackberries and a sweet meringue layer.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Blackberry Meringue

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the base

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a bowl, beat together the sugar and eggs for 2-3 minutes.

  3. Add the warmed butter, flour, baking powder, and milk; mix well.

  4. Spread the mixture onto a baking sheet, making it thinner in the center than at the edges.

Bake and top

  1. Bake until done.

  2. Remove from the oven and cover with blackberries.

  3. Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks and mix in the crushed sugar.

  4. Spread the meringue over the blackberries.

  5. Bake for 1 minute, then serve.

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.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the oven.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they form the airy meringue topping.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the base together after baking.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the base.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the heat, helping the base rise and lighten.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and helps stabilize the whipped egg whites.

The step that matters

Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks. Egg whites need to be whipped until they hold stiff peaks to trap air. Underwhipped whites stay runny and collapse, while overwhipped whites turn grainy and weep. Adding sugar gradually helps keep the foam stable.

“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.

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