Tag: meringue

Coconut Meringue Cookies

Coconut Meringue Cookies

Published on by Rebecca5 Comments

My husband and I have never really been into the sappy Hallmark holidays.  Mushy cards and sloppy romances were never my thing.  On Valentine’s Day we play a little game, trying to out-do each other with the most inappropriate and ridiculously raunchy cards we can find, then we’ll watch a James Bond.  Instead of flowers, or in addition to, he’ll often buy me a new record to add to our vinyl collection – The Beatles or Pink Floyd or something else he knows I love – and pick up some oysters on the way home.  I’ll cook a big meal while he puts on the record.  It starts with the oysters, followed by maybe steak with béarnaise sauce (he likes his meat just barely kissed by the flame), sautéed potatoes, butternut squash bisque, with a sweet little treat at the end.

My love language is music and his is food, so it works . Continue reading “Coconut Meringue Cookies” →

Lemon Meringues with Grand Marnier

Published on by Rebecca10 Comments

I don’t think it’s a secret that I’m obsessed with everything lemon + meringue.  Everything except lemon meringue pie.  It’s the texture of a partially cooked meringue that tends to weep sticky tears over a much too sweet custard, and that egg-y smell that tends to come with it.  My approach to making a lemon meringue pie is to cook everything separately, including the meringue, in the form of meringue cookies.  These can then be carefully arranged on top just before serving – no weeping or worrying that they are uncooked.  If I don’t have time, or patience, to make a full-blown lemon meringue pie, I make these instead.  Big, pillowy, delicate meringue cookies, flavoured with lemon zest and a splash of Grand Marnier. Continue reading “Lemon Meringues with Grand Marnier” →

Bûche de Noël

Published on by Rebecca11 Comments

I always return to traditions during the month of December.  Throughout the rest of the year traditions have a reputation for being  “stuffy” or “old-fashioned,” but at Christmas time, when the world seems to be moving at record pace, and not necessarily in the direction we want it to, there’s nothing more comforting than falling back into the old and familiar.  Pulling out the old cookie cutters and sorting through the recipe box for those cookies we bake only once or twice a year; dusting off the boxes of decorations, digging through sheets of tissue paper to find the ornaments we packed away so carefully last year.  It’s almost like a long over-due visit with dear old friends.  (And when the dog accidentally knocks one of those ornaments off the tree, like she did today, and it shatters on the floor there are always tears as I sweep up the pieces.) Continue reading “Bûche de Noël” →

Triple Chocolate Pavlova

Triple Chocolate Pavlova

Published on by Rebecca5 Comments

Can I just talk for a minute about that certain magic you find only in chocolate?  You know, the one the Mayans knew of and harnessed millennia ago?   The one that has been firmly embedded in our collective human consciousness ever since?  That craving that can be suppressed but never fully satisfied?  Chocolate is at once an aphrodisiac, an antidepressant, a stimulant to fuel passion and to excite creativity.  It’s the food of the gods that’s also known to lower cholesterol, increase life expectancy, prevent heart attacks, and boost the immune system.  Now, if you’re someone who likes to look at the facts, then you may find yourself wondering if dessert, rather than breakfast, is actually the most important meal of the day.  But, if you’re like me and tend to think with your stomach, then you already know that it is. Continue reading “Triple Chocolate Pavlova” →