Meringue Hearts

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I've made meringue to top a lemon pie, but have never made baked meringues. These meringue hearts were made as a decoration to top our chocolate tart (see next post), but were a sweet treat on their own and turned out very pretty. They are quite easy to make and only take three ingredients - egg whites, sugar and cream of tartar. The time is in piping and baking them. They need to bake at a very low temperature for a few hours and then stay in the oven overnight. So, you won't want to make them if you have a lot of other baking to follow. I made them a day in advance of the tart as they keep well. You have to make sure to whip the meringue to stiff peaks (a mixer is essential) and I separated the meringue into three bowls to make white, pink and red hearts. The prettiest ones where when the colors were mixed a little when I switched colors while piping. They are such a sweet Valentine decoration and looked so nice on top of the chocolate tart.