How to Separate Egg Whites to Make Meringue

A Few Tips on Turning Eggs into Fluffy Souffles or Meringues

Mar 1, 2008

It's not rocket science, but there is some science involved in separating eggs properly so that you can then beat the egg whites into submission, or meringue, or souffle.

Eggs are a kind of super food. They are probably the most economical source of protein. And they have magical properties that cooks and bakers have used for centuries. Here are some basics, especially if you have a meringue or a souffle in your future.

Buy and Cook with Fresh Eggs

Buy local, preferably from someone you know. A neighbor or a local farmer who holds forth at a farmers' market are great sources. You've heard the horror stories about hens never seeing the light of day confined to cages stacked six high where they can barely stand up. If you think there's no difference in the eggs, take the challenge and buy some from your local farmer and compare them to the ones from the corporate farms at the supermarket. Look at the color of the yolks. Taste the difference. In the market buy the ones marked free-range or cage-free.

Worried that an egg is no longer fresh? Test it by putting it in a small bowl of cold water. If it floats, it's old. Toss it.

Room Temperature Eggs

When cooking or baking with eggs, always allow them to come to room temperature first.

How to Separate Eggs

Kitchen shops would love to sell you yet a gadget probably called a "foolproof egg separator," but you're no fool and it's just not that tricky.

Carefully crack the egg over a scrupulously clean glass or stainless steel bowl to catch the egg whites. As you break the egg, hold one half upright to nestle the egg yolk. The egg white will spill over the edge and into the bowl. So long as the yolk hasn't broken you can tip in carefully back and forth between the shell halves, avoiding the sharp edges, to extract almost all of the egg white. Then dump the yolk into a second bowl. If the yolk breaks, you can still dump it in with the other yolks, but if even a bit of the yolk has gotten into the bowl of egg whites, save what you've done for an omelette or a scramble and start over.

Beating Egg Whites

The key to brilliant, airy meringues and souffles is in scrupulously clean bowls and whisks or beaters. Oil, grease, or other impurities, or even a speck of egg yolk, will keep egg whites from properly aeriating when you beat them. You can certainly do the beating with a whisk and any non-reactive bowl. A hand-held electric mixer or a stand mixer equipped with a whisk will make the job go a little easier.

How to Tell When You've Got the Soft Peaks or Stiff Peaks the Recipe Calls For

When you lift the whisk or beater out of your beaten egg whites, the aeriated whites want to follow the whisk. When it finally separates a peak forms. A soft peak will tend to collapse a little. A stiff peak stays upright. That's all there is to it. Not so hard after all, was it.

Folding In Additional Ingredients:

When folding ingredients into egg whites, use a large metal spoon in a cutting and folding motion. Don't stir or you'll lose the air and deflate the souffle or meringue.

The copyright of the article How to Separate Egg Whites to Make Meringue in French Cooking Techniques is owned by Larry Ervin. Permission to republish How to Separate Egg Whites to Make Meringue in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.