therealjlow bakes | Golden Bites.

Golden Meringue bites.

I’ll be honest these started out as meringue kisses. The only problem? They need a piping bag and no cutting the corner off of a fold over sandwich bag is going to cut it. However these (which only need a spoon and spatular – and a little bit of creativity) look almost better. Like little chunks of gold.

My original ideas were to match the colour choices in our dining room and living room, copper/gold accents with the delicious, bitesize easyness of a sugary snack. Not to mention these look even more perfect stacked in a tall kilner jar on your table!

So what do you need? Uber simple all you need is,

3 large egg whites

175 grams of caster (or fine) sugar

and decoration of your choice! (I choose metallic dark gold food colouring and edible gold glitter) 

Method

1st – Separate your egg whites. If you are a nervous egg breaker do this into a separate bowl and empty the good whites into your mixing bowl after. Whilst warming the oven at 140degrees.

2nd – I’ll give you my grandparents Low trick to the perfect Meringue – whisk your egg whites (preferably with an electric whisk – no one needs a sore arm ok?) until stiff peeks. This means that when you gently pull the whisks free the egg sticks up (sort of like a wave) and the crest doesn’t fall over and failing that, (my grandfather was a daredevil I tell you) carefully tip your bowl. If you can hold it upside down and your mixture doesn’t fall out? You’ve got it. Perfect.

3rd – Fold or whisk in your sugar in small portions at a time. I’ve done both and both methods work perfectly! If you whisk it in however don’t whisk your egg whites as stiffly.

4th – Using a spatular or spoon, spoon your mixture on a tray lined with baking paper in whichever look you want. A piping bag means they can look uniformed when cooked and actually “kisses” will need this method instead of my slapdash one!

5th – decorate! My favourite part. I have used the end of a spoon covered in food colouring and I have also used toothpicks to draw colour through the mixture! Because these are actually also put in the killner in terms of colour (ombre) I have also steadily folded in the food colouring, making the mixture darker as I go as well. Finally sprinkle your edible gold dust across the top for that little bit of glitter!

6th – Cook! These little blighters might take seconds to make but they take far longer to bake! Between 30-40 minutes, keep an eye on them so they don’t burn and to tell when they are done, take them from the oven. Pick them up, if they come away easily and the bottoms don’t break off and you can tap them easily without disaster than voila! they are done! lay them to cool on a cooling rack until fully cold.