More About Eton Mess and Summer Puddings Worldwide

Making meringue is a good way to use up egg whites which are left over from using egg yolk to make mayonnaise.

I tried excellent Eton Mess meringue at The Hayes Conference Centre, Swanwick, north of Derby. 

Eton Mess

Eton Mess is named after the town of Eton in England. I had previously had Eton Mess in Eton, which is across the bridge from 

Windsor.

I have also tried making it at home. It can look like it says, a mess, unless you make the cream into elegant waves and peaks on top on a large platter. Another way to serve it is in individual servings in glass bowls so you can see the red colour of the fruit peaking though the white. The fruit helps offset the scariness of the meringue.

It is also a way of serving up the broken remains of meringue from a pavlova from tea time. But be careful about keeping cream. At home and runny cream offered to add to a pavlova would usually be served separately in a jug, which can be kept in your fridge and brought out when needed, to be sure it doesn't go off. But I would more usually add cream after dinner, rather than at tea team.

Pavlova

Pavlova is a dish of circular solid meringue with fruit in a dip in the centre, made popular when served by a hotel to attract customers at tea time with a dessert named after the dancer Pavlova who had a successful tour. Pavlova is claimed as a national dish invented by both New Zealand and Australia.

When I visited Australia and New Zealand I tried to track down where it was made first. As far as I remember, it was served at a hotel in one country, named after Pavlova there, then mentioned on their menu or history or the local newspaper; but a similar meringue with fruit, not necessarily circular  as a raised ring with a base in the middle, appeared perviously in a recipe in a book or magazine in another country.

Nowadays, 2016, we get fruit all year in the UK, not just summer, flown in from the Channel Islands which are warmer, and grown in greenhouses in 'the garden of England', Kent. However, the fruit at other times of year is not as soft and flavourful and juicy. When fruit is abundant in summer the prices come down and the most popular puddings include Summer Pudding, made in a small mound with fruit encased in bread soaked to a red or black currant colour.

Whilst is it exceptionally hot in the UK in summer 2016, hotter than Europe where may Brits are taking holidays, it is winter in New Zealand and Australia. In previous centuries you had food in the season when it was harvested locally. But now you can fly to England or Australia and New Zealand for summer weather and summer puddings twice a  year. 

The BBC has comments and links to recipes for Eton Mess.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/eton_mess

The Hayes, where I enjoyed Eton Mess this month, is one of a group of three centres in the UK. More details about them from: http://cct.supafi.co.uk