Christmas in July Dessert........Deconstructed Eton Mess

Before I get into part 3 of Christmas in July, I just want to mention to those of you who follow this recipe of the week loyally, I am taking part in a very interest cooking competition that is online from Freshly Blogged, the competition starts on the 8^th July 2013, and I will be needing your votes to make it through to the next round, so please go onto the Freshly Blogged website and register as a voter and see what I am going to create in the weekly challenges.

Now for today’s dessert, a quick and sexy little dessert that has the Christmas flavours running through it, berries, brandy, cream, meringue hmmmmmmm everything you need, so myself and newly appointed pastry chef, Elri Booyse who I hope I get to work with for a decent while as she is talented and creative, sat and thought a little out the box and came up with this one….

Serves: 4

Difficulty: Easy

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cooking Time: 1 Hours

Ingredients for the meringue

4 egg whites

½ tsp lemon juice

200g castor sugar

Method

Place the egg whites in a mixer and whisk until they start to form soft peaks, then add in the castor sugar a little at a time so that the last bit is totally incorporated before you add in the next bit, when it is at stiff peak add in the lemon juice.

Pipe onto a baking tray lined with grease proof paper and bake at 150˚c for 1 hour.

Ingredients for the Berry Compote

600g mixed berries

150g treacle sugar

1 vanilla pod scraped

¼ tsp cinnamon

2 cloves

100ml brandy

100ml water

Method

Place all the ingredients into a pot onto the stove and let simmer for about 10 minutes until the liquid start to thicken, take off the heat and leave to cool.

Ingredients for the Amarula Creme

500ml Fresh Cream

100ml Amarula

Method

Whisk the cream until it starts to thicken, then whisk in the Amarula and whisk until stiff peak.

Now to build your master piece, break up the meringue and place this at the bottom of your serving dish, I have gone with Martini glasses as they are sexy, then take a very little bit of the cream and spread a layer on top of the meringue, this will stop the red juices of the berry compote from going into the meringue so you will have a perfectly layered dessert. The place a layer of berries on top of that and then top it all off with the crème.

I have garnished this here with an edible flower and a bit of sugar work, but I think that will take a little more explaining in person to do, you can replace it with the pods of the vanilla you have scraped.

Bon appetite