Vegan Meringues with Coconut Cream

Serves: 10-12 Prep: 30_minutes Cook: 2_hours

Info

Our vegan meringues are made from aquafaba (the water from a can of chickpeas!) It sounds odd, but it makes a great vegan egg replacer! Give this dessert a go if you are looking for something a bit more special this Easter weekend. What's even better is you'll hopefully already have the ingredients you need in your cupboard!

Ingredients

400g tin Biona Organic chickpeas (aquafaba removed)

75g Golden caster sugar

400g Biona Organic Coconut Whipping Cream (that's been in the fridge for at least 8 hours)

1 x Jar of Biona Organic peaches

Pistachios for garnish

Method

Preheat the oven to 120C/100C Fan/Gas ¼. Line a large baking tray with baking paper.
Drain the chickpeas in a sieve over a measuring jug – you should have around 150ml of chickpea aquafaba liquid from the can. Weigh out 50g/1¾oz of the liquid. If you need to make more meringues, you can double or triple the ingredients. Keep the remaining chickpea water and chickpeas covered in the fridge for up to 3 days to use in other recipes (how about our chickpea curry).
Pour the liquid into a stand mixer, or use a hand whisk, and mix on a medium setting for 2–5 minutes, or until white, light and standing in firm peaks when the whisk is lifted. If you remove the whisk and turn the bowl upside down, the mixture shouldn’t slide. If it does, continue mixing.
Slowly add the sugar to the whisked aquafaba, just a tablespoon at a time, with the mixer on high speed until it is all incorporated. Continue whisking until very firm and glossy – this could take 5 minutes more. The sugar needs to be fully dissolved, so there should be absolutely no grainy texture detectable in the meringue.
Use two dessert spoons to drop 14–16 large spoonfuls of meringue onto the prepared tray, or pipe onto the tray using a large piping bag and star nozzle. Bake for 2 hours. Leave the oven door shut and cool for a further 2 hours before removing from the oven.
Whisk the coconut cream until it reaches soft peaks.
Place a tablespoon of coconut cream into each meringue and top with the jarred peaches and crushed pistachios if using.