Sid and Hospobaby are making dessert which, says mum Chand, is how to ensure she eats her dinner.
It’s an age-old practice but one that still works — Hospobaby has to eat all her dinner if she wants dessert. My quandary is to come up with healthy desserts that don’t involve too much work. Hospobaby has a great liking for all fruits, and Sid has created with this dessert inspired by her love for kiwifruit (she can eat eight kiwis in one sitting), passionfruit and mandarins. You can substitute her favourites with those of your own children and they can get involved picking and preparing the fruit. Our little chef helps make the meringue and feels rather important using the mixer to whip the egg whites. She then assembles the dessert on the plate, just the way she likes it.
The meringue will keep for two days in an airtight container and the vanilla creme will keep for up to four days in the fridge. Just change the fruits used each day and you have a healthy dessert on hand for a few days.
Summer fruits and vanilla meringue
Serves 4
For the meringue
100g egg white (whites of 3 size 6 eggs), at room temperature
160g icing sugar, sifted
For the vanilla creme
200g mascarpone
1 scraped vanilla pod
Milk
100g icing sugar
Zest of 2 oranges
To assemble
6 kiwifruit
3 mandarins
Sorbet, store-bought (we used passionfruit)
1 sachet Fresh As freeze-dried raspberries
- Heat the oven to 90C. Line a large, heavy baking tray with a silicone baking mat or baking paper.
- Place the egg whites in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a whisk attachment. Add one heaped tablespoon of the icing sugar. Whisk until the mixture forms and holds soft peaks. Add the remaining icing sugar, continue whisking on high speed until the meringue is shiny and forms/holds stiff peaks.
- Spread/spoon desired shapes on the baking tray. (We made large circles and broke them in to shards.) Bake for 1½ hours or until crisp and dry. If your meringues are higher, you will need to bake them for longer. Baked meringues need to be stored in an airtight container away from humidity.
- For the vanilla creme: in a bowl combine the mascarpone with the vanilla seeds. Add a splash of milk and mix. Add the icing sugar, orange zest and another splash of milk. Whisk together until you get a smooth, silky texture.
- Slice or chop the kiwifruit just before you are ready to serve. Segment the mandarins.
- Arrange the fruit on a plate. Spoon some mascarpone on to the fruit (you could use a spoon to make quenelles, or use a piping bag). Scoop the sorbet next to the mascarpone and sprinkle crushed freeze-dried raspberries around the plate. Finish by decorating with shards of the meringue.
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*”Hospo”, short for hospitality, is a term used regularly in the hospitality industry. Chand and Sid own the restaurants Sidart and Cassia, so Zoya has been part of the hospitality industry from day one, hence the term “hospobaby”.
