If you follow a vegan or vegetarian diet, you know how hard it can be to find tasty dessert options. We are here to tell you that chickpeas will once again come to the party and give you more options. Chickpeas are some of the most versatile globes of goodness that you can use for almost anything, and they taste amazing. For these chickpea vegan meringues, you’ll be using the aquafaba in the tin, but the chickpeas will have many other uses outside of the dessert.
Tips for your chickpea vegan meringues
The recipe uses the aquafaba in the tin which is used to preserve the chickpeas. It is almost impossible to whisk by hand unless you have a lot of endurance and strength, so please use an electric whisk. It’s often used as a replacement for eggs anyway, so works perfectly well for your meringues. You can enjoy them as they are or as an addition to any of your favorite vegan or vegetarian desserts.
Don’t let your vegan or vegetarian dessert get boring. These chickpea vegan meringues are the way to go and they’re always perfect.
Chickpea vegan meringues Recipe
10servingsPrep time
20minutesCooking time
2hours Total time
2hours
20minutes
Ingredients
- 400g tin chickpeas (150 ml of aquafaba)
- 150 g golden caster sugar
- 1½ tsp cream of tartar
- 1 pinch salt
- 1 tsp vanilla paste
Method
- Prepare a couple of baking trays with baking paper and preheat the oven to 110°C / 90 fan / gas mark ¼.
- Drain the tin of chickpeas over a very clean and dry bowl of a stand mixer or a large mixing bowl if you are using an electric whisk. Please note that the chickpea water (aquafaba) cannot be whisked with a hand whisk unless you have endless patience and want a serious arm workout. You will be whisking for days unless you use an appliance.
- Place the chickpeas in a bowl in the fridge to use for something else later. Ursula Lake’s recipe book has many recipes where you can use chickpeas.
- Ideally, the chickpea water should measure 150 ml. Place the mixing bowl on a digital scale while doing this to check that you are accurate. An average tin of chickpeas generally contains about 150 ml aquafaba, but it’s sometimes a little over, so it’s worth checking.
- Add a pinch of salt to the water and whisk at the highest speed until the aquafaba turns stiff and white (just like an egg white would). Try the famous “holding it over your head” test to make sure you have whisked enough.
- In a separate bowl, combine the sugar and cream of tartar.
- Start adding the sugar mixture one tablespoon at a time, making sure that the sugar is really dissolved before you add the next one. You can test it by rubbing a little of the mixture between very clean fingers to check if it feels grainy. If it does, then keep on until it feels smooth.
- Once all the sugar has been added, add the vanilla and mix on high speed for a couple more minutes until the mixture looks glossy and thick.
- Spoon the mixture onto prepared baking trays allowing a bit of space for the meringues to spread while they cook. Pipe the meringues directly onto the tray using a piping bag or simply spoon even heaped piles of the mixture onto the tray.
- Place the trays in the preheated oven and bake for 2 hours until the meringues are crisp on the outside. Don’t open the oven, not even once. Trust that all is well!
- After two hours, turn the oven off and leave the meringues to further dry and totally cool down. A clever trick is to make the meringues about 2 hours before bedtime so that you can turn the oven off as you go to bed and leave the meringues to cool overnight.
- Store the meringues in an airtight container. They should last at least a week.
- For a very simple pudding, mix up some coconut yoghurt with a little vanilla bean paste. Smash up a few meringues and layer them in a bowl with the coconut yoghurt and some fruit. Berries work particularly well for a vegan take on an Eton mess.
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