Today I traveled to the Northeast and made some whoopie pies from page 146. My motivation? I had the ingredients! We’ve been having some epic storms for days here in Florida and the roads are all flooded making shopping impossible, so until this passes, I need to find recipes in the book that don’t require any ingredients that I don’t already have available.
With that said, these little whoopie pies are made of awesome! They make you feel like a kid again. I know cupcakes have been the hot retro dessert for many years now, but personally, I’d like to see whoopie pies make a comeback, then you can have shows called “Whoopie Wars” although I guess that could be taken the wrong way!
Now I must add that I made the “7 minute frosting” on page 69, as was called for in the recipe. That sounds so simple, doesn’t it? Ah, but it’s actually another variation of an Italian Meringue! That Martha sure is clever!
I have friends from culinary school who won’t touch an Italian meringue with a 10 foot pole because they’re too intimidated. Why? Because it’s not that easy to time whipping the egg whites with your sugar coming up to just the right temperature. In the case of this frosting, it was 230° which is a bit lower than the 235° – 240° that’s typical for an Italian meringue. Once I was watching a cooking competition that had actual pastry chef preparing a frosting with an Italian meringue and she couldn’t understand why her egg whites kept cooking when she was adding the sugar that had cooked to 280°! I was yelling at the television “They’re cooking because you don’t cook the sugar to 280° you idiot!” And I’m leaving out all the swear words I used when I yelled at her, because I’m polite and stuff.
I liked the instructions on the 7 minute frosting because it was very specific. The reality is that you can’t time things to the exact minute in cooking because everybody’s stove is different and even the humidity in the kitchen can impact cooking times; but it’s good to have a general idea of your timing. I think I’ve been taking my meringues off too soon out of fear of over-whipping them, because this time I went longer and it really did turn out much better.
As you might be able to tell from the picture, I used a cutting round to shape the pies so that I could make them perfectly round, but that’s optional. But this was a terrific dessert, chocolatey, creamy and fluffy; perhaps my favorite so far in the project!
