Peppermint Meringue Cookies Recipe

This recipe post was compensated by SoFluential Media for Shriners Hospitals for Children^® for the annual Be Burn Aware campaign #FireandBurnPrevention 

I was posting on my Facebook wall the other day lamenting about how I went to go make cookies for our Great Christmas Cookie Bake of 2017 and realized I was out of flour due to an overzealous baking fest at Thanksgiving. Oops. Then my friend suggested we try making peppermint meringues – which are flourless (perfect for my gluten free girl!) and only need a few ingredients. I had never even heard of these cookies before but I do like some peppermint and I love the idea of making one cookie that all of my kids including Anna can eat.

Oh my. These are just like the crunchy yet soft peppermint bonbons my mom used to buy at the corner store years ago. I’ve never found those since, but I crave those old candies and these peppermint meringues are the closest thing I’ve found.

I did truly use a glass dropper to dispense peppermint extract into my cookies, and modified my recipe from a bunch of other sites to get exactly what I wanted. The result is what my boys are now calling their favorite Christmas cookie ever. In fact, I have a batch drying in the oven right now and they are already asking to eat this entire peppermint meringue cookies recipe when they come out in a few hours.

I have always thought that meringues were difficult, but these are actually super easy peppermint meringue cookies as long as you follow couple of specific protocol. One – you have to make sure that your utensils, your bowls, and your hands are completely clean. No grease or residue. You don’t have to be OCD or anything but a little residue could throw off your entire recipe.

Two – you have to make sure you don’t accidentally get egg yolk in your egg whites. That’s why for this recipe I actually use an egg separator. and Three – you have to know what stiff peaks are when you beat eggs. Stiff peaks will actually hold a pointy shape at the end of your mixer when you pull it out of the bowl and turn it on end to look. Take a look at this great visual to confirm that you know what stiff peaks look like before you start mixing up your Peppermint Meringue Cookies Recipe.

Making your cookies red and white stripes is easy if that is the design you want. Just pipe the tube of red coloring gel directly onto the sides of the bag like this. Then fill the bag with meringue just like you normally would to pipe frosting. When you create your shapes – the red food dye will color the meringues and create a red and white color pattern on your peppermint meringues. You can use any color you want, make them striped or solid, or simply leave the meringues plain white — they have a glossy look almost like metallic and it is very pretty.

I love cooking with my kids and this peppermint meringue cookies recipe was fun to make with my son today. He helped beat the cookies which was great because you have to beat these cookies for a very long time and both of our arms got tired even with using an electric mixer. [update: These cookies are a lot easier if you use a stand mixer. Our arms got tired with the hand mixer yesterday but today the stand mixer made the long mixing time a breeze!] When we get our kids in the kitchen – which is super important as they learn life skills like cooking – we need to be very careful to protect them from the ever present possibility of burns.

Children should be supervised in the kitchen and use appropriate safety gear like pot holders as needed. And we can find so many things for our little ones to help with when they aren’t ready to handle pans going into the oven or stirring hot liquids on the stovetop yet. Little ones can help mix cookie dough, roll dough in toppings, use a pastry bag with a decorating tip to pipe the peppermint meringue cookies, and so much more without ever having close contact with the heat source.  As parents its just really important to be aware of the potential hazards and be burn aware so that we can be diligent to keep our kids safe.

Since the 1960’s Shriners Hospitals for Children has provided critical, surgical andrehabilitative burn care to children, regardless of the families’ ability to pay. But with the Be Burn Aware campaign – they go an extra mile to help keep families safe and promote these simple tips to save lives. Shriners Hospitals explains that the best burn treatment is prevention. Test your safety knowledge with a five-minute quiz on their site and follow these guidelines for keeping your holidays safe:

• Don’t leave lit candles unattended – ever!
  27% of U.S. adults surveyed admit to leaving lit candles within reach of children.
• Turn pot handles toward the back of the stove to keep them out of a child’s reach.
  25 % of Americans surveyed reported that they don’t take this simple step for safety.
• When you’re cooking, keep a lid or cookie sheet nearby to put out a potential fire.
  47% of the people who took the survey skip this simple tip.
• Water fresh-cut trees daily. 45% of Americans surveyed do not water live Christmas trees every day, even though 70% reported they knew they should. A dry tree can ignite in seconds making this one of the deadliest types of fires! Keep trees away from heat sources like fire places, heaters and candles.
• Inspect your lights. Replace any that have kinked or frayed wires.

Don’t forget you can print the peppermint meringue cookies recipe by clicking on the little green printer icon in the top right corner of the recipe.

Peppermint Meringue Cookies Recipe

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• Author: Amy Blevins
• Prep Time: 15 Minutes
• Cook Time: 1 Hour
• Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
• Yield: 20 Cookies 1x

Ingredients

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• 3 Large Egg Whites
• 1 Pinch Salt
• 1/8 Teaspoon Cream of Tarter
• 1 Cup Super Fine Sugar (Regular sugar works too.)
• 4 Drops Peppermint Extract
• 1/2 Cup Crushed Peppermint

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Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 225º.
2. First, make sure that your utensils are completely clean and free of grease and wash your hands and the hands of any little helpers thoroughly. Any bit of grease or residue will throw this process off.
3. Next, separate your eggs so that you have exactly three egg whites with no yolk. I used a handy dandy egg separating tool since these egg whites need to be perfectly pure.
4. Beat your egg whites and pinch of salt until they get frothy. This only takes a few minutes and you’ll know because the surface will be covered in bubbles.
5. Add the cream of tartar.
6. Beat now until soft peaks form when you remove the beaters. Just a few minutes at this step.
7. Add sugar a small scoop at a time, continuing to beat on medium speed until stiff peaks form. Really stiff peaks. As in stand straight out on the end of your mixer stiff.
8. Add the peppermint extract using a dropper — four drops total. Too much will overwhelm your tongue!
9. Beat the peppermint extract into the mixture, being careful not to over beat.
10. Line your cookie sheet with parchment paper or aluminum foil.
11. Place a star tip in your disposable piping bag and line the edges of your bag with red food coloring gel.
12. Fill the piping bag with meringue.
13. Pipe shapes onto the lined cookie sheet.
14. Top the cookies with crushed peppermint.
15. Bake for one hour.
16. Leave cookies in the oven for at least two more hours until they are completely dry. It may take overnight.

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