Here is an easy chocolate meringue cookie recipe.
Chocolate meringue. What a delicious treat. Did you know you can whip up meringue, add some chocolate and make crisp, sweet chocolate meringue cookies?
We are going to share our easy chocolate meringue cookie recipe with you. Trust me, you are going to love them!
There are so many variations on how to make a meringue cookie. This chocolate meringue is a rich and very tasty way to enhance meringue for the chocolate lover in your life.
1. Preheat oven to 225°F. Separate egg whites from the egg yolks. Do not get ANY egg yolk into your egg whites or your meringue will not fluff properly for chocolate meringue cookies.
2. Add egg whites to a clean mixing bowl and start your mixer. You can use a hand mixer or a stand mixer such as a KitchenAid mixer, which you might find much easier when making meringues since you will be standing there for several minutes mixing. Mix the egg whites for about 1 minute BEFORE adding any other ingredients. Why? It all comes down to food science. See the tips below.
TIP: The science behind whipping egg whites for meringue and timing when to add the sugar is soo important, and is often why people have problems with their meringue.
Sugar adds sweetness to the meringues, but also just as important, sugar adds stability to meringue. You see, as you mix the egg whites, the mixer is breaking down the egg white proteins, which creates air bubbles.
If you add sugar too soon to the egg whites when making meringue, it interferes with the breakdown of the egg white proteins so the air bubbles don't form properly.
Then, you only get tiny air bubbles in the meringue, resulting in questions such as "Why are my meringue cookies so crumbly?" and "Why are my meringue cookies dull or not very fluffy?" The answer is, you added your sugar too soon, or, all at once. You need to add the sugar later (read on).
If you add your sugar too late to egg whites when making meringue, for example after the mixture has been mixing for several minutes and is starting to form peaks, you are adding the sugar too late. The sugar will not be able to dissolve and you will get grainy cookies.
This is the optimal time to add your sugar to make the best meringue cookies. The air bubbles have had a chance to form from the egg white proteins being broken down, and there is still enough time for your sugar to dissolve and not be grainy at all.
3. After about 1 minute of mixing the egg whites with the mixer at the highest speed, slowly add in thesugar, about 1/4 cup at a time, letting it mix in before adding the next 1/4 cup of sugar until it is all mixed in.
4. Add the cream of tartar to the egg whites after the sugar is all mixed in. Continue to mix until the meringue looks glossy and peaks form, anywhere from 4 to 7 minutes. Here is what your meringue should look like now:
5. Add your cocoa powder to the meringue and stir it in with a spoon or silicone spatula. Stir until combined. If you don't totally combine the chocolate, you will get a marbled effect, which also looks lovely.
6. Put the chocolate meringue into your piping bag or cake decorating tool, and pipe out the chocolate meringue cookies onto a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. You can be as artsy or as practical as you want when piping meringue cookies. The design is up to you :)
7. Put chocolate meringue cookies into your oven at 225°F for 45 minutes, then turn the oven off. Do not open the oven door here or take them out, just let them relax in the warm oven for another hour. Imagine it's the cookie day spa. This will dry them out for that perfectly crisp, light meringue texture that you are going for.
8. Take the chocolate meringue cookies out, let them cool and store in an airtight container.
TRICK: Make some mini chocolate meringue cookies by just piping Hershey kiss-sized drops on a baking tray. They are so cute and are great to just pop one of these in your mouth! Here is what the mini chocolate meringue cookie kisses look like close up.
Here are some questions you may have about meringue cookies, answered:
If you find the meringue cookies are a bit chewy the next day, then some moisture may have gotten in (maybe they didn't cool completely before putting them in the container, or the container was not super airtight). You can fix this by putting them back in the oven at 200°F for about 10 minutes! Meringue problem fixed.
Your meringue cookies are crumbly because you probably added the sugar to your egg whites too soon. Read the tips after step two in this recipe to learn about the best time to add sugar to egg whites for meringue.
Your meringue cookies are grainy because you likely added the sugar too late in the process of whipping the egg whites. Read the tips after step two in this recipe to see when to add sugar to egg whites when making meringue to learn when the perfect time to add sugar is.
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