Passionfruit Pavlova

the national dessert of the antipodean summer: a crisp-shelled, marshmallow-hearted meringue heaped with whipped cream and finished with the pulp of fresh passionfruit

Origin: Australia

From the journey of Passion Fruit.

The pavlova is the great celebration dessert of Australia and New Zealand, and the two countries have argued over its parentage for the better part of a century; what is certain is that it was named for the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova, who toured the antipodes in the nineteen-twenties, and that it appears on tables at Christmas, at New Year, and at every summer gathering in both nations. Its defining quality is a texture found in no other meringue: a crisp, dry, pale shell giving way to a soft, sticky, marshmallow-like heart, achieved by working cornflour and a little vinegar into the meringue and baking it long and slow. What crowns it is not incidental. Passionfruit is the classic and, to most Australians, the only correct finish: whipped cream is spread over the cooled shell and the pulp of several fresh passionfruit spooned over the top, so that the sharp, seedy, intensely perfumed juice runs down through the cream. Nothing else cuts the sweetness of meringue and cream so cleanly, and the crackle of the black seeds against the soft cream is half the pleasure. A passionfruit vine on the back fence and a pavlova on the table are, together, about as antipodean as food gets. The parentage is genuinely open and the atlas does not award it. Helen Leach, an anthropologist at the University of Otago, made the documentary case for New Zealand in The Pavlova Story (2008), counting twenty-one New Zealand recipes in print before the first Australian one appeared in 1940. The Oxford English Dictionary revised its entry in 2010 to give the earliest known use of the word as a New Zealand one, a Davis Gelatine booklet of 1927, and that citation is routinely quoted without the detail that undercuts it: the 1927 recipe is for a layered jelly and not for a meringue at all. What the printed record supports is therefore narrower than the headline and still points the same way, since the New Zealand meringue recipes follow within a couple of years and the Australian ones do not. Australia answers with a 1935 recipe attributed to Bert Sachse of the Esplanade Hotel in Perth, and with the plain fact that the dessert has been a fixture of its Christmas table for as long as anyone can remember. Neither country will concede, and what is not in dispute is the decade, the ballerina, or the fact that both nations eat it in enormous quantity on the same day of the year.

Ingredients

Meringue

  • 4 whole egg whites, at room temperature
  • 250 g caster sugar
  • 2 tsp cornflour
  • 1 tsp white vinegar
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 pinch salt

Topping

  • 400 ml double or thickened cream
  • 1 tbsp icing sugar
  • 6 whole ripe passionfruit

Method

  1. Heat the oven to 150°C (130°C fan) and line a baking tray with parchment, marking a 22 cm circle. Whisk the egg whites with the salt to stiff peaks, then add the caster sugar a spoonful at a time, whisking well between each addition, until the meringue is thick, glossy, and holds a firm peak.
  2. Whisk in the cornflour, vinegar, and vanilla. Spoon the meringue onto the marked circle, building the sides a little higher than the centre to make a shallow nest, and roughing the sides up with a palette knife.
  3. Put the pavlova into the oven and immediately reduce the temperature to 120°C (100°C fan). Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, until the outside is dry, crisp, and pale (not browned), then turn off the oven and leave the pavlova inside, door slightly ajar, until completely cold.
  4. Not long before serving, whip the cream with the icing sugar to soft, billowing peaks and spread it over the top of the cooled pavlova, keeping it within the raised rim.
  5. Halve the passionfruit and spoon the pulp and seeds generously over the cream, letting the juice run down the sides. Serve at once, cut into wedges.

Notes

The bare meringue shell can be made a day ahead and kept in an airtight container somewhere dry; humidity is its enemy and will soften it. Passionfruit is the classic Australian finish, and many cooks add sliced banana beneath the cream or scatter over strawberries and kiwifruit as well, though purists insist on passionfruit alone. For a sharper contrast, a little of the pulp can be stirred through the cream as well as spooned over the top.

The Gastrographer

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