Meringues

I'm making meringues to take to a friends special birthday party. Steve used to have a joke that I could make a pavlova before he could make his breakfast (actually I have this morning). Once you've got the knack of meringues, they are easy, and they always look so beautiful. I use Delia Smith's recipe, that can be used for individual meringues or a pavlova. I use my food mixer, but before I had this, used an electric hand whisk. 









Ingredients
3 large egg whites
175g caster sugar

Method
Preheat the oven to 150C
Put the egg whites into a very clean and dry mixing bowl. Make sure that there is none of the yolk in the mixture.
Whisk until very stiff, you should be able to turn the bowl upside down without the mixture moving (see photo)
Add the sugar a bit at a time and continue to whisk until the mixture is stiff and glossy and stands up in stiff peaks.

Cover a couple of large baking trays in slightly oiled greaseproof paper. Spoon on dessertspoon size amounts of the meringue mixture at equal spaces apart. Cook for one hour, then leave in the oven with the oven turned off to cool down.