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Dessert

Meringues

Meringues are light, sweet treats made from whipped egg whites and sugar, baked until crisp.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Meringues

Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Meringues

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a cool oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Cover a flat board with oiled paper.

Make and pipe the meringue

  1. Whip the egg whites to stiff peaks.

  2. Stir in the castor sugar and vanilla extract.

  3. Transfer the mixture to a piping bag with a plain or fancy tip.

  4. Pipe small rounds onto the oiled paper.

  5. Sift additional castor sugar over the meringues.

Dry and serve

  1. Dry in a cool oven at 300°F (150°C) for about three hours.

  2. Turn the meringues over, scoop out any soft part underneath, and dry again.

  3. Fill with sweetened whipped cream flavored with vanilla.

  4. Store in a biscuit tin to keep them crisp.

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. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  2. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  3. Egg + vanillatop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together27,347 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Egg whites
Whipped into a foam that gives the meringue its structure and lift.
Castor sugar
Sweetens and stabilizes the foam, helping it hold its peaks and dry crisp.

The step that matters

Drying in a cool oven. Meringue must dry slowly at low heat so it sets without browning. Higher heat can cause cracking, browning, or a sticky interior, and moisture left inside makes the meringues soft.

“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 meringues recipes

Italian 23Cream 9Apple 8Dry 7Spanish 4Egg-Shaped 3 See all 42 →

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