Italian Calabrian Bergamot Meringues | Meringhe al Bergamotto di Reggio Calabria

Sep 29

11 min read

Meringhe al Bergamotto di Reggio Calabria (Italian Calabrian Bergamot Meringues)

These are French meringues scented with bergamot from Reggio Calabria: raw whites whipped with sugar and dried rather than baked, until they turn bone white and crisp all the way through. The perfume, somewhere between lemon, orange blossom and Earl Grey, never touches the foam directly. It travels inside the sugar.

Yield: about 24 meringues. Prep: 30 minutes. Drying: 1 hour 45 minutes. Cooling in the oven: 45 minutes. Difficulty: intermediate. Course: dessert or petit four. Region: Calabria.

The Story

Bergamot is the strangest citrus Italy grows, and almost all of it grows in one place. The commercial groves run along a narrow strip of the Ionian coast in the province of Reggio Calabria, rarely more than a few kilometres deep, squeezed between the sea and the first slopes of the Aspromonte, from around Villa San Giovanni down toward Monasterace. Roughly ninety percent of the world crop comes from this band. The tree will live in other warm places, but only here does it fruit in quantity with the balanced oil that perfumers and pastry cooks want. It is fussy about cold, and the mild winters, the sea breezes off the Ionian and the mineral soils below the mountain give it a season that few other coasts can offer.

The fruit itself is hardly eaten. It is sour, bitter and slightly astringent, most likely a cross between sour orange and lemon, and since the eighteenth century it has been grown for the essential oil pressed from its peel. That oil is the citrus note in eau de Cologne and the reason Earl Grey tastes the way it does. It carries the protected name Bergamotto di Reggio Calabria, and the harvest runs from November to March, when the fruit turns from green to pale yellow and the rind is at its most fragrant. Fruit picked in early winter smells greener and sharper, while fruit picked in February is rounder and more floral.

In the kitchen bergamot arrived late and stayed small, as zest in liqueurs, marmalade, candied peel and the occasional biscuit. In Reggio itself the fruit turns up in gelato, in liqueur and in candied slices sold by the pasticcerie. Meringue is a natural partner, because the pasticcerie of the south have long sold small white meringues by weight from glass jars, and a sweet that plain has room for a strong perfume. The difficulty is chemical rather than culinary, and it explains the entire method below. The oil that makes bergamot worth using is the one thing an egg white foam cannot tolerate, so the whole recipe is a way of delivering the fragrance without ever letting the oil meet the whites. What follows is a French meringue, the simplest kind, with two ingredients, one careful trick and a long, patient drying. The result looks like almost nothing and smells like the whole Ionian coast.

Ingredients

For the meringue

Egg whites, room temperature, 5 1/4 oz (150 g), about 4 large
Superfine sugar, also sold as caster sugar, 10 1/2 oz (300 g)
Cream of tartar, 1/4 tsp (1 g)
Fine sea salt, 1 small pinch

For the bergamot sugar

Fresh unwaxed bergamot, zest only, 2 fruits, about 2 tbsp (12 g)
Superfine sugar from the amount above, 10 1/2 oz (300 g)

For finishing, optional

Dark chocolate, 70 percent, 2 oz (55 g), shaved into thin curls
Fresh sheep milk ricotta, well drained, 1/2 cup (120 g)
Heavy cream, cold, 2 tbsp (30 ml), to loosen the ricotta
Powdered sugar, 1 tbsp (8 g), sifted
Dried zest sifted from the sugar, a pinch, for dusting

On the sugar: superfine sugar dissolves quickly and leaves no grit. If you only have granulated, pulse it in a blender for 20 seconds first. On the eggs: whites from eggs three or four days old, separated cold and then brought to room temperature, whip higher and hold better.

On the fruit: use bergamot with an intact, fragrant, unwaxed skin. Out of season, replace it with the zest of one lemon and one small orange. Never use essential oil sold for perfumery.

Preparation

Perfume the sugar

Zest the bergamots with a fine rasp, taking only the coloured skin and none of the white pith beneath. Tip the sugar into a bowl, add the zest and rub the two together between your fingertips for about 2 minutes, until the sugar looks damp, turns faintly yellow and smells strongly of bergamot. The crystals are doing the work of a mortar, breaking the oil sacs so the oil coats each grain. Do not use a food processor, which heats the sugar and turns the zest to paste.

Dry and sift the sugar

Spread the sugar in a thin layer on a tray lined with parchment and dry it for 10 minutes in a 200°F (95°C) oven, or for 1 hour on the counter. It must return to loose, dry crystals. Cool it completely, then pass it through a medium mesh sieve and reserve the dried zest that stays behind for dusting. What passes through is fine, dry, fragrant sugar with no pieces of rind left in it.

Set the oven and prepare the trays

Heat the oven to 200°F (95°C), without fan if possible, and set two racks in the middle. Line two trays with parchment, using a dab of meringue underneath each corner to hold the paper flat. Check the oven with a thermometer, because many ovens run 25°F (14°C) hotter than the dial.

Degrease the bowl and start the whites

Wipe a clean stainless steel or glass bowl and the whisk with a paper towel dampened with white vinegar, then dry them. Separate each egg over a small cup to keep any yolk out. Whisk the whites with the salt and cream of tartar on medium speed until they turn white and foamy, with a texture like soft shaving foam. Do not add any sugar yet. The whites need this loose foam first, so the bubbles are small and even before the sugar arrives.

Rain in the sugar slowly

With the mixer running at medium high speed, add the perfumed sugar one tablespoon at a time, waiting about 15 seconds between additions. Hurried sugar sinks to the bottom and weeps later as beads of syrup on the baked surface. The whole addition should take 5 to 6 minutes, and the whites will swell into a thick, shiny mass as the crystals dissolve.

Test the sugar between your fingers

Beat until the meringue is stiff, glossy and thick enough to stand in a firm peak that does not bend at the tip. Rub a small amount between two fingers. If it feels gritty, the sugar has not dissolved, so keep whipping for another minute and test again. Stop as soon as it is smooth, because an over whipped meringue turns dull, dry and grainy.

Shape the meringues

Spoon the meringue into a piping bag with a large open star tip and pipe 24 rosettes about 2 inches (5 cm) wide onto the trays, spaced 1 inch (2.5 cm) apart. A spoon works as well for a rustic result. Dust the tops lightly with the reserved dried zest. Work quickly, since piped meringue left standing weeps and loses volume.

Dry rather than bake

Dry the trays for 1 hour 45 minutes, rotating them once at the halfway point. The meringues must not colour at all. Turn the oven off and leave them inside with the door closed for 45 minutes. They are ready when they lift cleanly from the parchment and sound hollow when tapped underneath.

Plating

Serve the meringues at room temperature on a matte white plate, three to a portion, stacked slightly off centre so the crisp shells show their piped ridges. Beside them place a quenelle of lightly whipped sheep milk ricotta and two thin shards of 70 percent dark chocolate. The bitterness of the chocolate and the milky acidity of the ricotta lean on the bergamot. Finish with a pinch of dried zest and nothing else, so the perfume of the meringue is the first thing that reaches the table. For the ricotta, whip it with the cream and the powdered sugar until it holds a soft shape, and chill it until service. Add a small spoonful of warm honey if you want a richer plate. Assemble only at the table, because the meringue starts to soften as soon as it meets the cheese.

Professional Technique

The essential oil in bergamot zest is an antifoam. An egg white foam stands because dissolved proteins unfold around each air bubble and link into a thin elastic film. Anything that spreads across that film weakens it, and citrus oil behaves like fat: it is oily, it moves to surfaces and it displaces protein at the bubble wall. A trace of oil is enough. The film stops holding, the bubbles merge and the whole bowl slumps. For this reason the aroma is never added to the mass, in any form.

The zest is rubbed into the sugar instead. Crystals scrape open the oil sacs in the rind and the oil coats each grain. Drying the sugar removes surface moisture so it flows freely and does not clump. By the time the sugar goes in, spoon by spoon, the protein film has already been built and the dissolving sugar thickens the liquid around it, so the oil arrives as a trace inside a syrup, protected, never as a droplet.

The dose keeps that protection intact. Use 12 g of zest for 300 g of sugar, about 4 percent by weight. At 2 percent the perfume is faint, and beyond 5 percent the foam softens and the white pith turns the flavour bitter. Use only the coloured skin.

The bowl must be free of fat for the same reason. Plastic holds grease invisibly, so use steel or glass, wipe it with vinegar and dry it. Juice never goes into the meringue: bergamot juice is nearly all water and acid, carries almost none of the perfume, and thins a foam that is already 88 percent water. The acid the whites need comes as dry cream of tartar.

Texture and Moisture Control

A good meringue is a rigid sugar and protein foam with almost no water left in it. Every decision here serves that. The sugar is twice the weight of the whites, which produces a shell that dries hard instead of collapsing. Cream of tartar lowers the pH so the protein network tightens without adding liquid, and the salt sharpens flavour without affecting structure.

The oven is a dryer, not a heat source. At 200°F (95°C) the water leaves slowly while the surface stays white. A hotter oven sets the outside first, traps steam inside and gives cracked, tan meringues with a chewy centre. If your oven runs hot, prop the door open with the handle of a wooden spoon.

Humidity is the enemy afterward. Sugar attracts water from the air, so a finished meringue left on the counter on a humid day turns tacky within an hour. This is why the meringues cool in the closed oven, why they go into an airtight tin the moment they are cold, and why they meet ricotta or cream only at the table. In cool, dry weather the shells stay crisp for days. In a rainy week, dry them 15 minutes longer. Pipe rosettes of equal size so every meringue dries at the same rate.

Professional Mise en Place

Equipment and tools

Stand mixer or hand mixer with a clean steel bowl
Fine rasp, medium mesh sieve, piping bag with a large star tip
Two trays, parchment and an oven thermometer
Paper towels and white vinegar for wiping the bowl, a small cup for separating the eggs
Airtight tin lined with parchment, ready before the meringues come out

Prepared ahead

Bergamot sugar, dried and sifted, up to 1 day ahead in a sealed jar
Whites separated and left covered at room temperature for 1 hour
Meringues baked and stored dry up to 5 days ahead
Chocolate shaved and kept in a cool place, never in the refrigerator
Oven thermometer checked and racks set before the whites are touched

Service setup

Ricotta whipped and chilled, chocolate shaved
Plates at room temperature, meringues plated at the last moment
Zest for dusting in a small dish, one clean teaspoon for the ricotta quenelles
Tin of spare meringues within reach, since one always breaks

Chef Tips

Use whites that are a few days old and at room temperature, because they whip higher and hold better than fresh cold ones. Warm the sugar slightly in the oven for the first minutes of drying if the kitchen is cold, since it dissolves more easily. A cold, tight kitchen is a good place to make meringue, and a steamy one is not.

Weigh everything. Fifty grams of whites, more or less, changes the ratio and the drying time. Keep the sugar at exactly twice the weight of the whites.

Add the perfumed sugar in two batches if you worry about speed, but never dump it in one. If the bergamot is very fragrant, keep back one third of the zest and use it only for the dusting.

Test one meringue by cooling it for a full minute on the counter. If it is dry, the rest are ready. If it still bends, give the tray 10 more minutes.

Common Mistakes

Adding essential oil or juice to the whites. Oil collapses the foam and juice thins it. Put the zest in the sugar, and keep the whites to whites, salt and cream of tartar.

Using too much zest. More than 5 percent of the sugar weight brings bitter pith and enough oil to soften the foam. Stay near 12 g of zest for 300 g of sugar.

Leaving grease in the bowl. A trace of yolk or an oily plastic bowl stops the whites from reaching stiff peaks. Use steel or glass and wipe with vinegar.

Pouring the sugar in fast. Undissolved sugar sinks and weeps as sticky beads. Add it a spoonful at a time and test between your fingers for grit.

Baking at a higher temperature. Colour and cracks mean the surface set before the inside dried. Stay at 200°F (95°C) and do not open the door.

Opening the oven door too soon. A sudden rush of cool, damp air makes the shells crack and collapse. Keep the door shut for the drying time and the cooling.

Storing warm meringues. Trapped heat makes steam and the shells soften. Cool them completely before they go into the tin.

Wine Pairing

Greco di Bianco DOC: The Calabrian match, made from partly dried Greco grapes on the same Ionian coast where bergamot grows. Its amber colour, orange peel, apricot and honey echo the citrus perfume, while its acidity keeps the sweetness from cloying against the sugar in the meringue.

Moscato d'Asti DOCG: Gently sparkling, low in alcohol and only lightly sweet, with peach, sage and orange blossom aromas. The fine bubbles refresh the palate against the dry, dissolving meringue, and the floral notes run parallel to the bergamot without competing. Its low alcohol keeps the pairing light, which suits a sweet that weighs almost nothing.

Malvasia delle Lipari DOC: A sweet wine from the Aeolian islands, rich with apricot, dried fig and Mediterranean herbs. Its brisk acidity, born of volcanic soil and sea wind, cuts through the sugar and lifts the bitter edge of the zest.

Moscato di Siracusa DOC: A fragrant Sicilian Moscato with orange blossom, ripe peach and honey. Serve it well chilled, in small glasses, beside the ricotta, where its aromatic sweetness meets the milk fat and the dark chocolate. Its bright acidity keeps each mouthful clean.

Brachetto d'Acqui DOCG: A sweet, softly sparkling red from Piedmont, low in alcohol, with strawberry, rose petal and a hint of spice. Pour it if the plate includes the dark chocolate, where its red fruit and gentle bubbles soften the bitterness while the pale meringue dissolves between sips.

Storage & Reheating

Store the cooled meringues in an airtight tin at room temperature for up to 1 week, with a sheet of parchment between layers. Never refrigerate them, because the fridge is humid and the shells turn tacky.

For freezing, place them in a rigid container and freeze for up to 1 month, then thaw in the sealed container for 30 minutes so no condensation forms. The cooked meringues do not need reheating, only drying. Keep the tin closed except when serving. To revive a softened meringue, dry it for 15 minutes in a 200°F (95°C) oven and cool it again. Bergamot sugar keeps in a sealed jar for a week, though the aroma fades a little each day, so use it early. Ricotta cream keeps for 1 day refrigerated and is never mixed in advance with the meringues.