The Baking Bible: Pecan Praline Meringue Ice Cream Sandwiches
Just in time for the heat wave, this week we are making ice cream sandwiches. Actually, the recipe is for the cookie and how to assemble the sandwiches; there's no ice cream recipes in this book. The cookie, as you may have guessed from the blog title, are Praline Pecan Meringues, and they are made with muscovado sugar and lightly toasted pecans.
The meringues are really easy to make. Basically egg whites and the muscovado sugar are whipped to stiff peaks then the pecans are folded in. There are chopped and whole pecans in the mix; I think I would have preferred all the nuts to be chopped. Also, I would have preferred a heavier toast on the nuts. I doubled the toasting time but it still wasn't toasty enough for my tastes.
The fidgety part comes when getting the meringues onto the parchment-lined cookie sheets. It took a bit of time to get each blob to specified weight, then I had to go back and spread each out into a disk-like shape. Everything was sticky and I didn't bother to measure the size of the blobs. (Rose gives a measurement so that all the cookies come out pretty much the same--easier for sandwiching.)
The cookies bake for about ten minutes then are left to cool on their pan. They were really fragile as I was putting them away in an airtight container so I wondered how they would work for sandwiching. One cookie just fell the fudge apart.
Then comes the sandwiching part. We chose coffee ice cream which paired nicely with the cookies. Maybe the ice cream wasn't soft enough even though it was melting around the edges, but most of the cookies crumbled as I pushed the sandwiches together. The cookies held together enough for me to freeze them and wrap them individually, but I only did the first batch. The second batch we are snacking on as just a crumbly, yummy cookie. Mark doesn't like these cookies as much as he did the Dattelkonfekts but I like them as much but for different reasons. The muscovado sugar brings an almost boozy note to the meringues which I enjoy. Like I said before, I just wish the nuts were more toasty.
I skipped the optional ganache drizzle glaze because I am lazy, and if something's optional, I will most likely take the option to not do it. :)
As an ice cream sandwich, they are hard to eat. The cookies practically dissolve as the ice cream softens which is a bummer. I would prefer to have them on the side of the bowl of ice cream instead of being the bowl itself.
All said, I am looking forward to trying the other ice cream sandwich in the book and I would make these Praline Pecan Meringues again, but just for cookies.
The meringues are really easy to make. Basically egg whites and the muscovado sugar are whipped to stiff peaks then the pecans are folded in. There are chopped and whole pecans in the mix; I think I would have preferred all the nuts to be chopped. Also, I would have preferred a heavier toast on the nuts. I doubled the toasting time but it still wasn't toasty enough for my tastes.
The fidgety part comes when getting the meringues onto the parchment-lined cookie sheets. It took a bit of time to get each blob to specified weight, then I had to go back and spread each out into a disk-like shape. Everything was sticky and I didn't bother to measure the size of the blobs. (Rose gives a measurement so that all the cookies come out pretty much the same--easier for sandwiching.)
The cookies bake for about ten minutes then are left to cool on their pan. They were really fragile as I was putting them away in an airtight container so I wondered how they would work for sandwiching. One cookie just fell the fudge apart.
Then comes the sandwiching part. We chose coffee ice cream which paired nicely with the cookies. Maybe the ice cream wasn't soft enough even though it was melting around the edges, but most of the cookies crumbled as I pushed the sandwiches together. The cookies held together enough for me to freeze them and wrap them individually, but I only did the first batch. The second batch we are snacking on as just a crumbly, yummy cookie. Mark doesn't like these cookies as much as he did the Dattelkonfekts but I like them as much but for different reasons. The muscovado sugar brings an almost boozy note to the meringues which I enjoy. Like I said before, I just wish the nuts were more toasty.
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| crumbly sandwiches |
I skipped the optional ganache drizzle glaze because I am lazy, and if something's optional, I will most likely take the option to not do it. :)
As an ice cream sandwich, they are hard to eat. The cookies practically dissolve as the ice cream softens which is a bummer. I would prefer to have them on the side of the bowl of ice cream instead of being the bowl itself.
All said, I am looking forward to trying the other ice cream sandwich in the book and I would make these Praline Pecan Meringues again, but just for cookies.
Oh..the first photo of the drippy melty ice-cream looks so delicious! I agree with you it is a bit hard to sandwich the ice-cream....mine probably was too thick...i had to eat it as a topping. I opted out of the ganache drizzle too...
ReplyDeleteWell, they sure do look yummy! I toasted the pecans yesterday and wondered the same thing about the light toasting. I can pop them back in for a few more minutes before carrying on. I was just going to use regular brown sugar but after reading everyone's take on the Muscovado sounds like a repeat trip to the store is in order. I just love "I will most likely take the option to not do it. :)" Sounds like good advice to me!
ReplyDeleteYours looks more like the book too, drippy delectable ready to eat. I didn't notice the toastiness or lack thereof of the pecans… I'll toast more next time sounds good.
ReplyDeletei love it your just straight forward " I skipped the optional ganache drizzle glaze because I am lazy....":-) i totally forgot about that part that i didnt even mentioned it....:-)
ReplyDeleteI'll be baking these this afternoon. I thought they might crumble a bit if made into ice cream sammies, so I got a teeny-tiny container of coffee ice cream to make one or two into sandwiches. We'll enjoy the rest solo.
ReplyDeleteI really love this recipe, but my cookies didn't look nearly as pretty as yours. It's really humid around here lately, that may be a factor. Anyway, Jen, yours are beautiful!! Next time I'm going to make mine a bit smaller.
ReplyDeleteHi Jen, The same thing happened with mine, fragile and hard to fill with ice cream, but I could care less when I ate them. Our experience was very similar. I just loved the cookie, and your beauty shot too.
ReplyDeleteGreat post, Jen! I also found them a bit fiddly to fill so didn't bother freezing them after assembly. Just ate them as they were, drippy, melty and crumbly. You mentioned serving them separately and it sounds like a great idea!
ReplyDeleteI guess the conclusion is to wait until the ice cream is all melty. Next time I'me going to try and get mine a bit more "merengue-y"
ReplyDeleteI liked them served on the side best too. It balances out the icecream to meringue ratio better for me. I had the opposite problem to you - too chewy! They all look delicious anyway.
ReplyDelete