Ingredients:
For the Meringue Base:
4 large egg whites (room temperature)
200 g granulated sugar
1 tsp white vinegar or lemon juice
1 tsp cornstarch
1 tsp vanilla extract
For the Mascarpone Cream:
250 g mascarpone cheese
200 ml heavy cream (cold)
50 g powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
For the Red Fruit Topping:
150 g strawberries (hulled and sliced)
100 g raspberries
100 g red currants
100 g cherries (pitted and halved)
Optional: mint leaves and powdered sugar for garnish
Make the Meringue Base:
Preheat the oven to 120°C (250°F) and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Draw a 20 cm (8-inch) circle on the parchment as a guide.
In a clean, dry mixing bowl, beat the egg whites with an electric mixer on medium speed until soft peaks form.
Gradually add the sugar, one tablespoon at a time, beating on high speed until the mixture is glossy and stiff peaks form. This should take about 7–10 minutes.
Add the vinegar, cornstarch, and vanilla extract, and gently fold them into the meringue with a spatula.
Spoon the meringue onto the parchment, spreading it to fill the circle. Create a slight indentation in the center for the cream and fruits.
Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Turn off the oven, leaving the meringue inside to cool completely (about 2 hours).
Prepare the Mascarpone Cream:
In a chilled mixing bowl, whip the heavy cream until soft peaks form.
In a separate bowl, beat the mascarpone with powdered sugar and vanilla extract until smooth.
Gently fold the whipped cream into the mascarpone mixture until well combined. Chill until ready to use.
Assemble the Pavlova:
Place the cooled meringue base on a serving platter.
Spoon or pipe the mascarpone cream into the center of the meringue.
Arrange the red fruits on top of the cream, piling them generously.
Garnish and Serve:
Dust the Pavlova with powdered sugar and garnish with fresh mint leaves.
Serve immediately for the best texture.
Origin of Pavlova with red fruits and mascarpone cream:
Pavlova is a meringue-based dessert. Originating in either Australia or New Zealand in the early 20th century, it was named after the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova. Taking the form of a cake-like circular block of baked meringue, pavlova has a crisp crust and soft, light inside. The confection is usually topped with fruit and whipped cream. The name is commonly pronounced /pævˈloʊvə/ pav-LOH-və or (in North America) /pɑːvˈloʊvə/ pahv-LOH-və, and occasionally closer to the name of the dancer, as /ˈpɑːvləvə/ PAHV-lə-və.
The dessert is believed to have been created in honour of the dancer either during or after one of her tours to Australia and New Zealand in the 1920s. The nationality of its creator has been a source of argument between the two nations for many years.
The dessert is an important part of the national cuisine of both Australia and New Zealand. It is frequently served during celebratory and holiday meals. It is most identified with and consumed most frequently in summer, including at Christmas time.
A recipe for "Strawberries Pavlova" appeared in the New Zealand Herald on 11 November 1911, but this was a kind of ice block or sorbet. Annabelle Utrecht, who wrote a book about the possible origins of pavlova, believes that this is a reprint from England.
A 1922 book, Australian Home Cookery by Emily Futter, contained a recipe for "Meringue with Fruit Filling". This was the first known recipe for a food entirely resembling the modern pavlova, though not yet known by that name.
Another recipe for a dish bearing the name pavlova was published in 1926 by the Davis Gelatine company in Sydney. However, this was a multi-layered jelly, not the meringue, cream and fruit dessert known today.
Helen Leach, in her role as a culinary anthropologist at the University of Otago, states that the first recipe from New Zealand was a recipe for "pavlova cake" in 1929. A recipe for pavlova cake was published in The Evening Star on 10 November 1934.
It has also been claimed that Bert Sachse created the dish at the Esplanade Hotel in Perth, Western Australia, in 1935. In defence of his claim as inventor of the dish, a relative of Sachse's wrote to Leach suggesting that Sachse may have accidentally dated the recipe incorrectly. Leach replied they would not find evidence for that "because it's just not showing up in the cookbooks until really the 1940s in Australia." However, a recipe for "pavlova cake" was published in The Advocate in 1935, and a 1937 issue of The Australian Women's Weekly contains a "pavlova sweet cake" recipe. A 1935 advertisement for a chromium ring used to prevent the dessert collapsing also indicates that the term "pavlova cake" had some currency in Auckland at that time.
Other researchers have said that the origins of pavlova lie outside both Australia and New Zealand. Research conducted by New Zealander Andrew Paul Wood and Australian Annabelle Utrecht found that the origins of the modern pavlova can be traced back to the Austro-Hungarian Spanische Windtorte. It was later brought to the United States where German-speaking immigrants introduced meringue, whipped cream, and fruit desserts called Schaumtorte ("foam cake") and Baisertorte. American corn starch packages which included recipes for meringue were exported to New Zealand in the 1890s.
Another story is that an unnamed New Zealand chef created Pavlova in 1926 in a Wellington hotel. Food anthropologist Helen Leach of the University of Otago was unable to verify that this was true. She found at least 21 pavlova recipes in New Zealand cookbooks by 1940, the year the Australian recipes appeared. She wrote the book The Pavlova Story. The first she found was a multlayered and layered jelly in 1926. In 1928 from Dunedin, a walnut and coffee-flavoured meringue recipe was created and became popular throughout New Zealand. In 1929 a third recipe was published in the Dairy Farmer's Annual. Leach said that this third recipe was "stolen/falsely claimed by chefs/cooks across the Tasman". A fourth recipe was published in the Rangiora Mother's Union Cookery Book of Tried and Tested Recipes in 1933, two years before a similar recipe was published in Australia, later republished to raise funds for the Rangiora Church. This recipe was a single-layered small cake, whose preparation consisted in two egg whites, sugar and cornflour, but with no vinegar, baked in a sandwich tin. One year later a recipe was published in the New Zealand Women's Weekly, which contained four egg whites, a breakfast cup of sugar and a teaspoon of vinegar, to be cooked in a cake tin.
An article in Melbourne's The Argus from 17 November 1928 claims an "American ice-cream" was named after Anna Pavlova: "Dame Nellie Melba, of course, has found fame apart from her art in the famous sweet composed of peaches and cream, while Mme. Anna Pavlova lends her name to a popular variety of American ice-cream." This article may suggest that pavlova has American origins. However, it's unclear how these words should be interpreted and whether that article is relevant. Firstly, the authors of that article offer no evidence for their claims or any depth of discussion of their claims. Secondly, given that pavlova is not an ice-cream, it is highly unclear as to whether the words "American ice-cream" is referring to the modern pavlova dessert or something else entirely.
Michael Symons, an Australian then researching in New Zealand, has declared that pavlova has no singular birthplace. Rather, published recipes reveal the complex process of "social invention" with practical experience circulating, under a variety of names, across both countries. For example, Australians beat New Zealanders to create an accepted pavlova recipe as the 'Meringue Cake'. The illusion of some singular invention can be explained by distinguishing a second, associated level of "social construction", in which cooks, eaters and writers attach a name and myths to produce a widely-held concept that appears so deceptively distinct that it must have had a definite moment of creation.
Matthew Evans, a restaurant critic for The Sydney Morning Herald, said that it was unlikely that a definitive answer about the dessert's origins would ever be found. "People have been doing meringue with cream for a long time, I don't think Australia or New Zealand were the first to think of doing that."
In 2010 the Oxford English Dictionary noted that the first recorded recipe of pavlova was from 1927 in Davis Dainty Dishes, published by the Davis Gelatine Company in New Zealand. This was a multi-coloured jelly dish. Confusingly, the dictionary ambiguously listed the origin as "Austral. and N.Z".
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