This year I was a TA (teaching assistant) for a class at Cornell called Magical Mushrooms and Mischievous Molds. Its one of the largest classes at Cornell with over 300 people enrolled and is a popular way for non science majors to fulfill a science requirement. I taught the course last year as well including a lab section on Friday mornings. The students tended to be a bit quiet and tired last year, so for my section this year I tried something new. Every week I baked something themed to that weeks discussion. I tried to make these bakes as interactive as possible, especially in the later weeks. Some were straightforward, cinnamon rolls for a yeast focused lab, others were a bit more complicated, like a giant chocolate fungal fruiting body filled with edible spores or cream puffs that looked like lichen covered rocks.
For the first day of class, I started simple with meringue mushrooms. These are tasty, light cookies that are great for decorating woodland themed cakes or just for snacking.
Mushroom Meringues
Ingredients
Meringues
- 6 egg whites
- ¼ tsp Cream of Tartar
- 1½ cups Sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
- ¼ tsp salt
Assembly
- ½ cup chocolate chips or equivalent of a chocolate bar
Instructions
Make the meringues
- Add egg whites, cream of tartar, vanilla, and salt to a stand mixer or bowl
- With the whisk attachment beat on medium high speed until soft peaks form
- Slowly add in the sugar a spoonful at a time while you continue to beat at high speed
- Keep going until stiff peaks form
- Transfer the meringue to a piping bag and cut of the tip so there's about a 1/4 inch hole. You can adjust this based on what size you want your mushrooms to be
- On a baking sheet lined with parchment paper alternate between piping the caps and stems of the mushroom. To make the caps keep the tip of the pastry bag close to the baking sheet and pipe straight down so that the meringue spreads out into a small domed shape. For the stems start close to the baking sheet and pull upwards as you pipe to create a longer piece of meringue that stand on its own. They're mushrooms so don't worry about making them perfect, they'll all be a bit unique.
- Bake at 200 for 4-6 hours. They are done when they feel dried out and are no longer sticky at all. If after 6 hours they are still not done, turn off the oven and leave them overnight. This will dry them out well.
- You can let them cool and store them in a sealed ziplock for up to a week. Be very careful of any humidity.
Assembling the mushrooms
- Melt your chocolate in a microwave or over a double burner and let cool slightly
- Take the meringue caps and using a knife gently bore a small shallow dent in the bottom center of each one. Leave them upside down on your workspace. This is where you'll attach the stem
- Put a small dollop of chocolate over the indent you just made and then take a meringue stem and place it so that the tip goes into the indent and holds. If the stems keep falling off, make a larger indent. Let cool and serve.