How does meringue work

Understanding froth science helps create a better milky foam. The best froth, used in latte art , is called a microfoam. Microfoam is made in two steps.

First , you introduce air into milk by placing the tip of the steamer within the milk. Then you slowly bring it close to the top until the milk mixture starts to hiss.

Then you plunge the steamer tip deeper into the milk to create a whirlpool. This gently mixes the foam evenly throughout the milk so it becomes thick and velvety. According to Coffeegeek , froth that is totally white on the top means you made too much foam, or it has not been mixed evenly through the milk. If you overheat the milk, the protein gets totally denatured and can no longer form bonds across protein strands or incorporate enough air bubbles to make a decent froth structure.

Interestingly, skim milk can produce more froth with larger air bubbles because it has a higher protein content. Compared to milk, the amino acid chains in egg white albumen are much longer. Anything other than a minute amount of yolk and you should just start again separating the eggs out — save the original whites and yolks for something else. It just gives you a head start.

In your carefully whipped and very fluffy meringue, water and air bubbles are held in the foam. Think of how a sponge looks — a framework of material around pockets of air and water. All you need to do to a meringue is heat it enough to tighten the chemical bonds in the protein strands to finalise coagulation and to evaporate the water, leaving the framework intact.

Like Like. Excellent meringue information for those of us who love to know WHY things work the way they do. Thank you for this helpful post! Like Liked by 1 person.

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Learn how your comment data is processed. Skip to content Cooking is an art, but baking is definitely both an art and a science and few things seem to illustrate the science of baking as much as making a meringue.

Representation of what happens to protein strands in egg white — from 1. Good things are meant to be shared! This part of the egg contains fat , which interferes with how the proteins line up and coat all those bubbles that are supposed to bulk up your meringue.

This is also why chefs are discouraged from using plastic bowls for this purpose as they have a tendency to retain oils. And even though I washed my hands beforehand, perhaps residual oils sabotaged my baking venture. Jesse Rhodes is a former Smithsonian magazine staffer. Meringue cookies Image courtesy of Flickr user wiserbailey Chefs began whipping up meringue sometime in the early s.

In the Netherlands you can buy this in squares of approx. Cut some apples in pieces and mix with sugar and cinnamon to taste , place some apple mix in one half of the puff pastry and then fold the upper left corner onto the lower right corner to form a triangle. Fix both sides together with a fix and decorate with some egg to get a nice brown crust. Bake the puff pastry according to the instructions of the pack generally min at C. This is a method I generally use. Cut the butter in cubes and gently mix with water and flour.

Then follows a process of folding the dough, resting and cooling it, folding it again, etc. Just like with puff pastry. Once the dough is made they use half this amount for making 8 appelflappen. This they use to fill the squares of dough and also coat with egg.

In my experience, both methods should work for small drops. Hi there, just read through your article trying to troubleshoot something. My daughter and I make macarons using the Italian meringue method. Lately, in our meringues we notice these little strands that feel like plastic. We have noticed them in our meringues using two different types of sugar Domino and Dixie Crystals , both of which are supposed to be pure enough for merengues.

Any ideas what this could be from? We are usually able to see most of them during piping the macarons but of course some sneak through which always is a nice surprise. Thank you for any insights! Thanks for teaching me that you can make macarons using the Italian meringue method!

Maybe some of them break apart and do end up there? If this is happening, you should only have a few of them. You could solve this by whisking more slowly while adding the sugar syrup, preventing it from spinning to the sides. If you want to test whether they are made of sugar, take one of the strands next time you encounter them and place them in some warm water. Thank you very much! I also reached out to a pastry chef friend of mine and she said basically the same thing: to avoid hitting the whisk when pouring the syrup into the egg whites this is difficult for me — i will slow the whisk down even more but also to wait maybe a minute or so after letting the syrup get to temperature before adding it.

There should be no plastic coming into contact with anything, so it must be something with the sugar. And we do see them mostly clinging to the wire whisk, and yes there are only a few. We have much more success using Italian meringue with our macarons. In our climate, the french ones are unstable. My oven is old and non-convection, so I can only cook one pan at a time. Even the relatively short time the french method batter was sitting out caused it to do some funky things. Okay more of the same weird meringue adventures.

They did not dissolve in hot water. How would you avoid this? We have the eggs at room temp and we let the syrup sit for about a minute before adding it to the partially whipped whites.

The mystery continues! The proteins in eggs do denature, which is a permanent, irreversible change unlike the sugar, which should dissolve back in hot water. Are they very sticky?

Do they stick to the bowl? Could you whip the eggs a little more? I love the baking fundamental posts! So helpful for a newbie like me. I will be looking out for that cake and buttercream recipe! As soon as I saw this I knew I had to make these- so my son and I made them last night. Delicious and addictive. However, my meringue always attracts moisture and becomes sticky and chewy not what I want at all. Kindly advise what I can do to keep the meringue crispy for Long?

Thank you! Over time a meringue will always become softer, especially if you live in a humid climate. This will prevent extra moisture from coming in and softening the meringues.

If you use meringues on pies etc. Your best bet here is to add them as late as possible. The drier the crispier! When trying to whip up anything, be it egg whites, whipping cream, heavy cream, etc, it helps if you have your utensils cold. This better comprehension will without doubt aid in my future experiences. Thank you ever so much. Know I am late, very late to this post, but hope I can get an answer. I am trying to recreate the filling a bakery in my hometown, in the US, uses in their Cream Horns.

It requires no refrigeration, the Horns are kept on display in the shop and taken from the shelf or tray. From what I have read, a egg whites with icing sugar, aka powdered sugar, along with a sugar syrup should perhaps be the answer. I would probably start by adding the icing sugar to the egg whites before beating because I am after a dense meringue. Does any of this sound like it would work, or am I completely on the wrong track? I have a liberal brain, not scientific! I bake and cook by instinct!

A great treasure hunt What you describe reminds me a bit of a Swiss meringue.