My first pavlova was just a plain vanilla meringue with stewed boysenberries and whipped cream. The next time around I got a little more adventerous; the meringue was still plain vanilla, but I topped it with chocolate mousse and macerated cherries for a black forest sort of vibe. One of my favourites so far has been the spiced cherry pavlova: vanilla meringue, plain Greek yogurt, passion fruit, and stewed spiced cherries. The ube pavlova was my first attempt at a adding different flavours to the meringue. That one consisted of an ube (purple yam) meringue topped with coconut-flavoured Greek yogurt and fresh mango. I think it would've benefitted from a bit of ube extract (in addition to the ube powder) in the meringue and some toasted coconut or coconut extract with the yogurt to help boost the coconut's presence, but it was pretty good over all.
This pavlova follows a similar theme of meringue + whipped cream + fruit. But the meringue gets a bit of dark chocolate swirled through it just before baking. The berries can be pretty much whatever you have on hand. The original recipe called for a combination of strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, and cherries. I ended up using mostly strawberries with a few blackberries, raspberries, and blueberries mixed in. The berries are "mulled" by steeping in a mixture of apple juice (or red wine), orange juice, cinnamon, star anise, and cloves. I was using frozen berries rather than fresh and found the resulting mixture a bit more soupy than I would have liked. I think I'd cut back on the apple juice next time to help alleviate this. And I'd also be inclined to add a few more spices to really lean into the "mulled" aspect: maybe a bit of allspice and some black pepper?
Overall though, this came out great. The chocolate marbling actually worked pretty well. The chocolate flavour came through nicely. And the mulled berries, malted cream, and bitter-sweet chocolate-y meringue all complemented each other nicely. I'd definitely make it again. That is... if there weren't so many other flavour combinations to try!
Dark Chocolate Marbled Pavlova with Malted Whipped Cream and Mulled Berries
Adapted from Taste.com.au
Ingredients
Meringue
- 4 large egg whites1
- 1/2 tsp. cream of tartar (or white vinegar)
- 1 Tbsp. cornstarch (cornflour)
- 220g sugar
- 100g dark chocolate, melted
Berries
- 2-3 whole cloves
- 2 star anise
- 2-3 allspice berries
- 3-4 black peppercorns
- 1 orange
- 125mL apple juice (or red wine)2
- 1/4 c. brown sugar3
- 1 (7-8cm) cinnamon stick
- 450g frozen mixed berries4
- 1/2 Tbsp. cornstarch (cornflour)
Cream
- 300mL heavy (35%) cream
- 2 Tbsp. malted milk powder (eg. Ovaltine)
- 1 Tbsp. icing (powdered/confectioners') sugar
- 1/4 tsp. vanilla extract
Directions
- Preheat oven to 120°C (250°F).
- Beat the egg whites on low speed for ~1 minute.
- Add the cream of tartar, increase to medium speed, and beat for another minute or two.
- Add the cornstarch and beat for another minute.
- Increase speed to high and begin adding the sugar ~1 Tbsp. at a time.
- Once meringue is thick, glossy, and forms stiff peaks, stop beating it.
- Drizzle in the melted chocolate and fold it through a few times. Don't mix it too thoroughly or it won't be marbled!
- Scoop the meringue onto a baking sheet and shape as desired. I like making a large meringue bowl/nest. You can pipe it onto the baking sheet if you want to be fancy, but I never bother.
- Bake at 120°C (250°F) for 65-75 minutes.
- Turn off oven and leave meringue inside to cool. (At least an hour, but as long as overnight.)
- Meanwhile, place the cloves, star anise, allspice, and peppercorns into a muslin or cheesecloth pouch.
- Zest and juice the orange.
- Add the spice bag, orange zest, brown sugar, and cinnamon stick to the apple juice and bring to a boil over medium heat.
- Boil the juice mixture for 7-8 minutes.
- Add the berries and continue cooking until the mixture returns to a boil.
- Boil for an additional 5 minutes.
- Remove the spice bag.
- Take a little juice out and mix it with the cornstarch. Pour this cornstarch mixture back into the pot and continue cooking for another minute or two.
- Remove from heat and stir in orange juice.
- Just before serving, combine the cream, malted milk powder, icing sugar, and vanilla extract.
- Use an immersion blender5 to vigorously mix until the cream thickens and gets fairly stiff. If you stop whipping too soon, the cream will be runny. If you go too far, the cream will split into butter and buttermilk. If in doubt, err on the side of "runny".
- Carefully transfer the cooled meringue to a serving platter.
- Spoon the whipped cream onto it.
- Spoon the mulled berries over the whole thing and serve immediately.
1 I ended up using 2 large and 3 small egg whites. Use your best judgement based on the size of your eggs. Back
2 The original recipe called for 250mL of apple juice or red wine, but it was also expecting fresh berries. I've reduced the amount of liquid and replace the fresh berries with frozen. Hopefully this should help make the final result a bit less soupy in the future. Back
3 The original recipe uses white (granulated) sugar. I used white sugar when I made this. I liked it just fine that way. But I think I might like it even better with brown sugar. I think it would give the mulling spices some extra depth. Back
4 The original recipe called for 150g each of strawberries and cherries + 125g each of blackberries and raspberries. All fresh. I used 550g of frozen mixed berries instead. This was fine, but I think it was a) too soupy and b) produced a bit too much topping relative to the meringue, so I've scaled back both the number of berries (slightly) and the amount of apple juice used to try to help with both of those issues. Back
5 You can use beaters (or even just a whisk) to make whipped cream. I advocate using a blender here because it produces a denser whipped cream that's more robust and resistant to deflating/melting than the lighter, airier whipped cream produced with a mixer/beaters/whisks. It'll be fine either way. This is just my preferred method. Back
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