I found myself with a surplus of egg whites after making my Mum’s Birthday Cake, so thought back to a family favourite; Fruit Pavlova! My mum would make a pavlova whenever we had people over and it always went down brilliantly. It’s actually something I had never made before, but knew Ben and I would love. I also had a surplus of cream, passion fruit and some leftover Chocolate Mousse from the Birthday Cake so knew I wanted to incorporate these.
I’ve listed exactly the ingredients I used in mine. But of course, if you like more cream on your pavlova you can add more. Same goes for the fruit I used. I wanted to create a variety of colour with the fruits I used, but you can use whatever fruit you like! It goes without saying that if you’d rather not have chocolate in the pavlova, you can also leave this out.
Ingredients for the Meringue
8 egg whites
500g caster sugar
2 tsp corn flour
Ingredients for the Filling
300ml double cream (or more for a creamier pavlova!)
The pulp of three passion fruits
Chocolate Mousse (recipe here)
500g green grapes
100g physalis
400g strawberries
225g blueberries
Method for the Meringue
- Preheat the oven to 150 degrees celcius and line a baking tray with baking parchment
- Whisk the egg whites in a bowl using an electric mixer until they form stiff peaks
- Add the caster sugar, a bit at a time, until the meringue is smooth and glossy. Then add the corn flour
- Turn the meringue out onto the baking parchment and form into your desired shape (I formed an oval) piling the sides higher than the middle
- Pop in the oven for 1 hour, then switch the oven off but leave the meringue in until fully cooled
Method for the Filling
- When the meringue is cooled, place on your serving plate and pipe your chocolate mousse into the well in the middle
- Whisk your cream until stiff then add your passion fruit pulp and spread over the chocolate mousse
- Chop your fruit, keeping aside about 6 physalis (for decoration) and arrange over the pavlova
- Peel back the capes of the remaining physalis and arrange over the pavlova in required decoration and you’re ready to serve!
We’re very much looking forward to the day that we can have people back in the garden, and I think I’ll be whipping up this pavlova on more than one occasion! As the meringue takes a while to make, it’s much more convenient to make it the day before. Then just construct the pavlova on the day you need it. It didn’t last long between the two of us, but if it’s not finished in one go it lasts a day or two in the fridge!
