The editors of Simply Delicious love to write a common type of recipe that includes the act of putting meringue on top of a fruit filled pie. 14-19: Old-Fashioned Apple Meringue is a mistake with all but the classic lemon custard version of a meringue pie. Apple and cherry do not carry a meringue the same way in my opinion.
The meringue clouds in the example photo would probably have been the ideal presentation method, however, my meringue came out runny so it didn’t clump very well. I was lucky that it cooked to a hard crust.
The TIPS section provided some knowledge I’ve heard before. I think I learned about sprinkling apple slices with lemon juice in an elementary school science class about acids and bases. I used lemon juice from a bottle, or else I’d have put some peel into the meringue.
The flour and sugar in the background are not ingredients surprisingly, the only sugar used was the amount in the glass bowl.
As Matt Damon said in Good Will Hunting, “How ’bout dem apples?” I peeled, halved, and cored the apples, then tossed them with lemon juice.
The lemon juice kept the slices from turning brown as I finished the herculean task slicing the apples in a consistent manner.
Shredding almond paste is not as easy as it seems. I almost lost a fingertip while using this microplane-style shredder.
This was my attempt at a beautiful floral arrangement and I tried to evenly distribute the shredded almond paste accordingly.
The basics of any meringue for a pie topping: egg whites and granulated sugar. I think i got a little bit of yolk in my whites. They look awfully yellow for just egg whites.
The whipping attachment of the mixing bowl makes quick work of adding air to the egg whites. This recipe yielded a lot of meringue.
There was more than enough meringue to spread around so I ignored the clumping direction. My meringue was also a little runny so it just naturally settled this way. It was glossy and smooth. My best guess is that I didn’t whip it long enough.
The meringue shell came out goopy and swirly and fluffy inside. It didn’t quite hold together as you’ll see in the next photo.
For some reason, I thought it was a great idea to serve this with some dried berry mix that we had in the pantry. I think I ended up picking off most of the berries and I barely finished the slice shown here. It didn’t hold together like a pie because there was no crust. The meringue didn’t hold the dish together, only the thin skin on top was solid. The inside was mushy and wet, not set up like a meringue ought to be. Regrettably, I did end up throwing out the rest of the dish because it didn’t taste very good. I don’t do that very often, but this dish deserved it.
GRADE: C-
