These sweet and creamy desserts are a take on the classic french dish Île Flottante (floating island). Poached meringues float on a layer of custard-like crème anglaise, which tops a bed of banana. Delicious!
Tiikat and Sisu used their imagination to create incredible giant floating meringues, inspiring this recipe. You can see Tiikat’s drawing of one in his Imagination journal entry.
The floating meringues in this recipe are not nearly as huge as Tiikat’s, but you could try experimenting with bigger ones if you wish. Just remember to adjust the cooking time!
Although this recipe calls for bananas, you could try using different fruit for the custardy sea bed.
This recipe is quite tricky, but there are ways to simplify it if you wish.
- You could use shop bought meringues. They will be of the crunchy kind, so different in texture to the poached ones, but will still work well.
- You could use ready made custard instead of making crème anglaise from scratch.
This recipe creates double the amount of meringue mixture than what you may need. For ideas of what to do with your leftover meringue mixture see the further suggestions at the bottom of the recipe.
Difficulty Level:
What you need:
Ingredients:
- 6 eggs
- 300 ml whole milk
- 300 ml double cream
- 1 tsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
- 250g caster sugar (100g for the crème anglaise, 150g for the meringue)
- 2-3 bananas
Equipment:
- Chopping board
- Knife
- Mixing bowls
- Jug
- Sieve
- Spoons (large mixing spoons and also normal tablespoons)
- Electric whisk
- Large saucepan or deep-sided frying pan with lid
- Measuring scales
Method:
- Crack your eggs and divide up your yolk and whites into two separate bowls. It is very important you do not get any yolk in your whites (the other way round is ok). Tip: Break and divide each egg separately into a cup before pouring them into a bow. This way if you by mistake get yolk into one white you can get rid of that without needing to get rid of all the whites you have already put into the bowl.
- For the meringues: Whisk the egg whites in a large bowl at a fast speed using an electric whisk. Whisk until stiff peaks form when the whisk is removed. Hint: Make sure your bowl is absolutely clean and dry before you put your egg whites in. Any grease will stop your meringues working properly.
- Make sure you have 150g separated for your meringues. Add one tablespoon of the sugar to the egg whites and continue to whisk until the mixture comes back to stiff peaks.
- Keep adding sugar, one tablespoon at a time, until 150g has been used, and the meringue is thick and glossy.
- Now begin to prepare the poaching liquid (and what will become the base for the crème anglaise). Heat the milk, cream and vanilla slowly in a large lidded pan or deep-sided frying pan. Bring to a simmer over a low heat (do not let it fully boil).
- Using two large tablespoons or serving spoons dipped in cold water, shape six large quenelles from the meringue mixture and place in the poaching liquid, over a very low heat for about 9-10 minutes, flipping the quenelles halfway through. Cover the pan with a lid while poaching. Make sure the poaching liquid doesn’t boil or the meringues will puff up then collapse.
- The quenelles should really puff up while cooked.
- When the quenelles are ready, transfer them to a wire rack to drain.
- Pass the poaching milk through a sieve into a large jug to get rid of any bits.
- You should be left with a creamy milk base to be used for a delicious smooth creme anglaise.
- In a large bowl, whisk the egg yolks and caster sugar together until pale and fluffy.
- Pour over the warm poaching milk, whisking continuously.
- Pour the mixture into a clean heavy-based pan and cook over a very low heat for 4-5 minutes stirring continuously until smooth and thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool.
- Cut 3 bananas into slices.
- Layer bananas on bottom of serving dish.
- Pour custard mixture over bananas to cover and place meringue islands on top of custard. Tip: Use a peeler to grate dark chocolate on top to make it look fancy.
Further suggestions
For this recipe you need half the amount of egg whites to egg yolks, but instead of wasting the extra egg whites, you can just use the extra meringue mixture to make crispy meringue shells.
These crispy meringues can then be used to make other tasty treats, for example mini pavlovas by topping them with cream and berries! Yum!
They can last up to a week in an airtight container and can also be put in the freezer and then left out to defrost a few hours before you want to eat them.
To make crispy meringue shells:
1. Spread the meringue mixture into thick circles on a baking sheet (or just dollop spoonfuls on).
2. Then simply bake at 140°C for 1.5 hours!
If you want to make one big pavlova, instead of lots of mini ones, spread the meringue into one big circle. Then after baking at 140°C for 1.5 hours, just leave the meringue in the oven while it cools down.
