meringue boccone dolce cake

By foodiva

Ingredients

• 12 large egg whites, room temperature
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/4 tsp. cream of tartar or citric acid
• 4-5 cups heavy whipping cream (at least 33% fat content, 40% is better; you can use only 4 cups of cream) or 6-7 cups if making 12X18 rectangular shape cake
• 1 – 1 1/2 cups sugar (1 cup if using 4 cups of cream)
• 2-3 tablespoons vanilla extract
• 100 g. dark chocolate, chopped
• 1/2 cup heavy cream, heated almost to boiling point
• 500 g. raspberry
• 200 g. blueberry, rinsed and dried
• 200 g. blackberry, rinsed and dried
• 1 lb strawberry, rinsed & dried, sliced
• 5 ripe bananas, sliced
• or any other combination and amount of fruits/berries you like

Details

Servings 9
Adapted from letthebakingbeginblog.com

Preparation

Step 1

Instructions Prep
Turn the oven to 200 F.
Cut out 3, 9.5-10 inch circles from parchment paper. With a marker, draw a 8 – 8.5 inch circle in the middle of each piece of parchment. Turn the parchment over and place each parchment circle over 9 inch round pan, set aside (you can use layered aluminum foil if you don’t have 3, 9 inch round pans).
Prepare a large pastry bag (or a gallon size zip-lock bag) fitted with a large star tip. Set aside.
Take a small zip-lock bag, open it, drape the sides over a glass/cup. Meringue
In a bowl of an electric mixer, fitted with a whip attachment, whip room temperature egg whites with cream of tartar/citric acid, starting with low speed and gradually increasing it as the egg whites begin to take shape and increase in volume.
With the mixer still running and once the egg whites become white and foamy, start adding the sugar, one tablespoon at a time. Continue beating until stiff peaks form . Careful not to over whip, or you will have to start over. Over whipped meringue looks chunky and broken, whereas properly whipped meringue looks glossy and smooth.
Fill the prepared pastry bag with meringue and in a swirl motion pipe the meringue inside the circles on the parchment paper. Place it on top of 9 inch baking pan bottoms, or upside down pans.
Try not to get out of boundaries as the meringue will expand in the oven. Each circle should be about ¾- 1 inch in height, if your pastry tip is not large enough to make it that tall in one layer, just make another spiral layer on top.
side note: it’s best to make 2 thicker meringue layers and one thinner. The two thicker will be the two bottom layers and the thinner one will be on top. The two bottom layers will absorb a lot more moisture then the top, as the bottom will do so from the weight and the middle one will do so because of being surrounded by whip cream from both sides
Place the pans in the 200F oven and dry for 10-12 hours. You can leave it in the oven overnight. The lower the temperature the whiter the meringue will be. If you can lower the oven to 180F, do so and extend the drying time. Chantilly Cream
In a chilled bowl of an electric mixer, fitted with a chilled whip attachment whip start whipping cold heavy cream, going from lower to higher speeds as it thickens. Once the cream is somewhat fluffy, add the sugar and vanilla extract and again start with low speeds and all the way to the highest speed, until the heavy cream is whipped to stiff peaks. Place in the refrigerator until ready to use (not more then 30 minutes). Chocolate Drizzle
Heat the cream until boiling.
Pour over chopped chocolate. Let sit for a minute or two and then mix with the spoon until smooth.
Pour into the prepared zip-lock bag. Close the end and snip off the corner of the bag. Assembly:
Drizzle the chocolate over all meringue layer, place in freezer to harden, 3-4 minutes
Reserve 2 cups of frosting for decoration and place in the fridge.
Prepare your berries.
On a serving dish, put a dab of Chantilly Cream, place the first meringue layer and press gently to adhere.
Spoon or pipe ¼ of the frosting on top of the meringue layer. Layer out the bananas and cover with ¼ of the frosting. Layer half of all the berries on top. Press them in gently. Place a couple of dabs of cream on top for the next meringue layer to adhere.
Place the 2nd meringue layer and repeat with the fruits.
Place the 3rd meringue layer (thinnest) and make 8 swirls all around the edge.
Cut strawberries in half and place one half on each swirl, sliced side up.
Place back in the fridge immediately, until serving time.

Instructions