These minty, pink-striped meringues are easy to make and use a clever decorating trick: Paint lines of food coloring gel up the sides of a pastry bag before filling it with meringue, and each cookie comes out striped as you pipe it. You can use this same trick with frosting for cupcakes.
| Level: | Intermediate |
| Total: | 3 hr 30 min |
| Active: | 30 min |
| Yield: | about 42 meringues |
Ingredients
- 3 large egg whites
- Pinch fine salt
- 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 3/4 cup superfine sugar
- 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract
- Red food coloring, preferably gel
Instructions
- Position oven racks in the top and bottom thirds of the oven and preheat to 250 degrees F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Beat the egg whites and salt with an electric mixer on medium-high speed in a large bowl until foamy. Add the cream of tartar and continue to beat until soft peaks form. While beating, add the sugar 1 tablespoon at a time. Continue to beat until stiff peaks form. Beat in the peppermint.
- Fold the top of a pastry bag fitted with a round tip over and down a few inches. Dip a paintbrush in the food coloring. Starting inside the pastry tip, brush a stroke of food coloring from the tip to the top of the bag. Repeat with 3 more evenly spaced strokes. Fill the bag with the meringue; try to spoon it directly into the center so as not to smudge the food coloring (though some smudging is inevitable). Pipe 1-inch-diameter mounds of meringue spaced 1 inch apart onto the prepared baking sheets.
- Bake until the meringues are no longer glossy and feel light and dry when picked up, about 1 hour. Open the oven for a few minutes, then turn it off and shut the door. Leave the meringues in the oven until they are completely dry inside, about 2 hours. The meringues can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 days.
Reviews
Has anyone used peppermint essential oil instead of extract?
My family love is so much
Loved these. I crushed candy canes up very fine and added it to the meringue instead of the peppermint extract. Turned out perfect.
Simple and beautiful!
This recipe was going well until I added the peppermint extract, the egg whites sunk immediately. Just a little heads up!
Too sweet and the peppermint was overwhelming.
I had lots of trouble with the egg whites losing their stiffness when the peppermint extract was added and “beat in” per instructions. I think it is the oil in the extract which caused this. Next time I make these, I will bring the whites to the desired stiffness, then I will gently fold in the peppermint extract. The food coloring stripes down the piping bag sides worked as described and made them look nice.
Loved this easy recipe! My turned out so wonderful. I first added 1/4 teaspoon of peppermint extract and then added more to taste! I used gel red food coloring and they look beautiful!
These are wonderful!!! They were a huge hit, even on a tray of other beautiful holiday cookies. These are requested for many holidays now; good think they are so easy to make. 🙂
Great cookies but I used 1/2tsp peppermint extract and it was WAY too much. I’d suggest a “light” 1/4tsp and taste it. That’s probably all you need. Mine taste more like mints than cookies haha
By the way my peppermint extract has alcohol and oil also. Not sure why that person’s fell, but it wasn’t the extract.