Lemon Sherbet Meringue Chicks

The cutest easter sweet treats that ever roamed the land!

This is our foolproof mother mixture. We use this method whenever we make our meringue kisses, giant meringues, pavlovas or decorative festive meringues – and now our Easter Chicks!

Our mixture is so easy to remember a 2:1 ratio of sugar and egg whites.

Ingredients:

  • 300g caster sugar
  • 150g free range egg whites
  • 3 drops of lemon essence
  • half a teaspoon of citric acid
  • 25g dark chocolate
  • 25g white chocolate
  • 0range food colouring
  • yellow food colouring

Method:

Preheat your oven to 200c. Line a small baking tray with baking parchment, pour in the caster sugar and heat it in the oven for 7 minutes. Heating the sugar helps to create a glossy, stable mixture. Pour the egg whites into a mixer and whisk them slowly, allowing small stabilising bubbles to form, then increase the speed until the egg whites form stiff peaks.

Take the sugar out of the oven, and turn oven down to 100’c (leave the door open to help speed this up.) With your mixer on full speed, very slowly spoon the hot sugar into the beaten egg whites, making sure the mixture comes back up to stiff peaks after each addition of sugar. Once you have added all the sugar, continue to whisk on full speed until you have a smooth, stiff and glossy mixture. You should continue to whisk for at least 5 minutes once sugar has incorporated. Feel a bit of the mixture between your fingers; if you can still feel the gritty sugar, keep whisking at full speed until it has dissolved and the mixture is smooth, stiff and glossy.

We flavour our chicks with lemon essence and citric acid to make a sherbet lemon flavour- it’s a real winner.

Gently fold in the lemon essence and citric acid, being careful not to knock any of the air out.

Now to pipe out your cute little chicks. Turn your piping bag inside out and paint with yellow food colouring, then spoon your meringue into your disposable piping bag and cut the tip off (about a 50 pence size hole). Pipe out your kisses by keeping the bag tight, straight and directly above your baking tray. Squeeze from a 2cm height from the baking tray and then let go before pulling up to form the lovely peaks.

Bake for about 35-45 minutes or until the meringue bases come off the parchment paper clean.

Leave your chicks to cool. In the meantime, melt your dark and white chocolate in separate bowls. Mix a drop of orange food colouring into the white chocolate, this will make your chick’s beak and feet.

Once the chicks are completely cool, take a paint brush and draw on a pair of eyes with the dark chocolate and then  beak and feet with the coloured white chocolate.

There you have it, a flock of lemon sherbet Easter chick meringues!