Playing Hostess

We had friends over for dinner this weekend and I (once again) broke the cardinal rule of entertaining: never try out a new recipe for the first time on guests.

For dinner we kept it casual and did make-your-own pizzas, but for dessert I made my first ever meringue topped with whip cream and berries. It's a Jamie Oliver recipe that should look like this:



Since I didn't take a picture of the one I made, we'll just say mine turned out exactly the same.

It was really easy to make and since I have one friend who doesn't like chocolate (I know, I know, I've tried to have him committed) and one who is gluten intolerant I think it's a great addition to my dessert repertoire. But next time I'd shorten the cooking time because I think it was a little overcooked. Mine had a slight golden tone vs Jamie's pristine whiteness and was a little dry at the edges. But it tasted really good, so that's all that matters, isn't it?

The recipe says it feeds eight to 10 people and when I plopped it down in front of our (two) guests we all laughed at how huge it was and how much we would have leftover. Four drinks later, and somehow the meringue had managed to disappear without anyone really being sure how it happened.