Tropical Pavlova

If you have been following the Great British Bake Off, you will have seen the tropical pavlova the bakers made for Vegan Week. My mum saw it and immediately decided that she wanted it for a birthday cake - so a few weeks later, when it was her birthday, I made it for her!

The vegan recipe included aquafaba (the water from canned chickpeas), but I didn't bother with that, or the vegan pastry cream. I like to change recipes round, and make them different, so I used a normal pavlova recipe (non-vegan) and substituted whipped cream for the pastry cream, which is what I would usually do on a normal pavlova.

The first time I made pavlova, I was surprised at how different the meringue recipe was to a normal meringue recipe. A normal meringue recipe just has sugar and egg whites, whereas a pavlova recipe has vanilla extract, egg whites, sugar, baking powder and vinegar! That was the thing I was most surpried about - I never thought you would put vinegar in meringue!

Here is the recipe if you ever wanted to make this delicious, fruity pavlova:

For the meringue:

3 egg whites
175g caster sugar
1 tsp cornflour
1 tsp white wine vinegar
1/2 tsp vanilla essence

For the filling:

500 - 600 ml whipping/double cream
1 tin pineapple rings/chunks
4 kiwis
4 passion fruit
1 pomegranate

1. Preheat the oven to 130°C, but turn it down to 120°C if you have a fan oven.
2. Line two baking sheets with baking paper, then draw a 20cm circle on the baking paper. I find it helps if you draw around a cake tin which is roughly that size.
3. Turn over the baking paper so the ink or pencil markings are on the other side, but you can still see them. If you can't, then turn it back over and go over it until you can see it.
4. For the meringue, seperate the eggs and put the whites in a bowl. Whisk them with an eletric whisk until they are in stiff peaks - if you lift the blades of the whisk out of the bowl, the mix should form little mountains, and not flop down.
5. Once you are sure the egg whites are stiff enough, add in the sugar, a quarter at a time. Whisk the mixture very well after each time you add the sugar.
6. Once you have added all the sugar, the mixture should be very shiny and very stiff. If you are feeling brave, hold the bowl upside down over the worktop, and if you are feeling really brave, hold the bowl upside-down over your head! If it stays in the bowl, then it is done!
7. Fold in the vanilla essence, cornflour and the vinegar, making sure you don't knock all the air out of the mixture. Bring over your baking trays and then either pile the meringue on top, and spread it out, or pipe it on like I did. I actually ran out of mixture on the second circle, so I just left a hole in the middle and filled it with cream and fruit once it was cooked!
8. Now, cook the meringue for about 1 and a quarter hours. I piped my meringue, and cooked it for 1 hour and a quarter, but found that it was a bit overcooked, so I recommend that you check it after an hour, then if it needs it, put it back in the oven for no longer than 15 minutes.
9. Once it is done, let them cool, and peel them off the baking paper. Try not to let them crack. Put the meringue circles onto a cooling rack, then if there are any crumbly bits of meringue that have fallen off, keep them - you can sprinkle them on top at the end.
10. Prepare your fruit - open your tin of pineapple, and if they are rings, fish them out with a fork and cut them up into chunks. If you have chunks, drain them (drink the juice, it's yummy!) and keep them in the tin for now. Cut the skin off the kiwis - you can't use a vegetable peeler, beacause it doesn't work (I found that out the hard way!) and then chop them up into chunks or semi-circles.
11. Cut the passion fruits in half, then scoop out the seeds with a spoon. Put the seeds into a bowl and keep them for later. Now for the messy bit - the pomegranate. Carefully cut it in half, but try not to get any juice anywhere - it stains! Put one of the halves into a bowl and scoop out the seeds with a spoon, separating the white pulpy stuff from the seeds. Put the seeds in a bowl and get rid of the pulp.
12. Whip the cream, then either pipe or spread half of it onto one of the meringue circles. Sprinkle half the pomegranate seeds, half the passion fruit seeds, half the kiwi and half the pineapple chunks on top. Now you can put the other meringue circle on top, and put all the remaining cream and fruit on top. Sprinkle the bits of meringue on top that you saved from earlier, and now, finally, you are finished!

So, after the hours of work you put into this delicious pavlova, it is finally finished! It took me a a good couple of hours to finish this, or  that's what it felt like! To be honest, it was probably only an hour and a half... But it was worth all the effort - my mum was really pleased when she saw it! We ate it that night for pudding after dinner, and it tasted amazing, even if it did fall apart when we cut it! You can taste the crunchiness of the meringue, and the sharpness of the passion fruit and kiwi, but every now and then you would get these little bursts of sweetness from the pomegranate seeds. I loved it!