Meringue Berry Cake

With the delayed spring this year we ended up having more winter than we needed or expected. Luckily, here at the west coast, there is no snowfall at least so we are spared from shoveling our driveways; however, the rain and the grim whether is just unbearable and keeps you feel kind of depressed sometime.

I love spring. As the matter of fact I love it to the extent that I would not mind if spring lasts forever. No wonder that I am getting so angry and frustrated because the winter has made itself so comfortable this year and is hesitating to leave.

The fragile spring, on the other hand, is trying hard to put its foot in so it helped the bulbs to sprout everywhere and blossom to bloom in most trees, but the old grumpy winter just does not want to give in. With the snow in some parts of the country, and the rain and grim whether elsewhere you cannot help it but hear the winter say: “ I got lazy this year so I will be sticking around for few more…”. Let’s hope that the winter wants to say “few more days”, so we will finally start enjoying the beautiful spring and all those plenty colors it brings along.

Wishing the spring a warm welcome, yesterday I made this Meringue Berry Cake. It reminds me on my childhood and beautiful, sunny and colorful springs I experienced with my siblings and the meringue cookies that my mother used to make for us at spring time. She did not have a hand mixer (and the standing ones were not even around at that time), or fancy kitchen gadgets, but with her jumbo whisk and few other modest utensils she made her cookies and cakes stand out and “be the talk of the neighborhood”.

Meringues are pretty easy to make and have very few ingredients, but the key to succeed with the meringue mixture is to have the egg whites at room temperature, and to make sure that the bowl and whisk are completely dry and free of any grease.

So if you ever get into a mood to make this cake you will need:

1. 8 egg whites
2. 4 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
3. 1 tablespoon lemon extract
4. 1 pound of mixed berries
5. 2 packages of desert whip

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees F (95 degrees C). Flour three separate baking sheets.
2. In a glass or metal bowl, whip egg whites until foamy using an electric mixer. Sprinkle in sugar a little at a time, while continuing to whip at medium speed. Add lemon extract. When the mixture becomes stiff and shiny like satin, stop mixing, and divide the mixture in three separate bowls and color the mixture to your preference. Transfer the mixture to a large pastry bags. Pipe three large meringues out onto the prepared baking sheets using a large round star tip.
3. Place the meringue sheets in the oven (both racks) and place a wooden spoon handle in the door to keep it from closing all the way. Bake for 3 hours, or until the meringues are dry, and can easily be removed from the pan.
4. Allow cookies to cool completely before assembling the cake. Prepare the dessert whip according to the package directions. Top each meringue sheet with a layer of dessert whip and berries and finish with a meringue sheet.

Hope that spring will feel more welcomed now, so we will soon start experiencing warmer weather and more sunshine.

Thank you for reading.
Besa