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You’ve heard the old joke before – who is the bravest person in the history of the world? Probably the first person who ever drank milk. Someone who pointed at the underside of a cow and said “You see that? I’m going to grab THAT… and whatever comes out? I’m going to drink it.”

Well, he or she might not qualify as “brave” but I give massive creativity points to the first person who was draining off a can of chickpeas and said “hey, you know what… this stuff would be great in desserts.”

Welcome to the wonderful world of “aquafaba.” This magical juice which can be used like an egg white in so many recipes, opening up a world of new possibilities for vegan and low-calorie recipes that otherwise seemed quite unlikely.

My interest is mainly in finding recipes that can be part of a weight loss program. Ways to continue to “eat happy” and enjoy what you eat, while still eating healthy, reducing calories, and avoiding a lot of processed foods. If that’s of interest to you, these little 2-calorie cookies, which can come in just about any flavor you can imagine, really fill the bill.

The key with these cookies is the method. While it is simple, I’ve found it needs to be followed pretty closely for a good result. Once you get the basics down, you can really let your creativity fly.

Aquafaba Basics

Aquafaba is literally “water from beans”… and it’s just what it sounds like. When you open up a can of chickpeas, it’s the water in which the chickpeas are floating. So that stuff you normally pour down your drain? That’s the good stuff we need.

Every can of chickpeas has at least 3/4 of a cup of aquafaba. I’ve never seen one with less… sometimes you get a bit more. Believe it or not, that makes a lot of meringue cookies. So what I normally do is make three different varieties of cookies from the juice of each can. That’s the recipe you’ll see below. I have, however, added the conversions for those would rather make larger (or smaller) batches of the same flavor.

Ingredients (per 80 meringue batch)

• 1/4 cup of aqufaba
• 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 1/2 teaspoon flavor extract
• color dye (optional)
• 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
• topping (optional)

As mentioned, one can of chickpeas yields 3/4 cup of aquafaba (which is also equal to 12 tablespoons). For those who want to avoid doing the math, here’s the complete info on how to make between 1-4 varieties from each can. AF = Aquafaba, COT = cream of tartar, EXT = Extract:

1 variety: 3/4 cup AF, 1/2 tsp COT, 1 tsp EXT, 1/4 cup sugar
2 varieties: 6 tbsp AB, 1/2 tsp COT, 1 tsp EXT, 3 tbsp sugar
3 varieties: 4 tbsp AB, 1/4 tsp COT, 1/2 tsp EXT, 3 tbsp sugar
4 varieties: 3 tbsp AB, 1/4 tsp COT, 1/2 tsp EXT, 3 tbsp sugar

To the Mixer!

If you’ve ever made regular meringue, you know the basic concept is that you’re going to be adding air into liquid. And that means whipping that air in with great speed. A stand mixer is certainly the easiest way, but if you prefer to use an electric hand mixer that would work too.

To begin, add 1/4 cup of aquafaba to the mixer and whip on high for 15-45 seconds until nice and frothy.

Once it’s frothy, stop mixing and add the 1/4 teaspoon of cream of tartar. Make sure it doesn’t clump on the side or bottom but gets fully absorbed. Then turn the mixer on again, and build quickly back to the highest speed and then walk away.

I mean it.

Where people go wrong here is to NOT give this the time it needs. Set a timer of six minutes and try not to touch it for at least the first five of those. At the midway point you will see it start to built volume, but it’s not enough. You want big, thick stiff peaks that will hold. It is possible to over mix (so I hear) so you don’t want to leave it endlessly… but in my experience the six-minute mark has been a good target.

Regardless, the result you’re looking for is what’s pictured here: A thick, heavy meringue with stiff peaks.

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Flavor and Time: of the Essence

Once you’ve got the stiff peaks, you need to flavor the meringue. If you’ve made mousse before, you know that the step after you’ve whipped all that lovely air into something only to watch it deflate, is the worst in any recipe like this. That’s why this is the step that does require an attention to timing.

Assuming you are going to be adding a color, I’d add a drop of two now. It does not seem to impact the meringue so it goes in first.

Once you’re ready with the flavor extract (I suggest 1/2 teaspoon is plenty… unless it is a very subtle flavor and you want to try a bit more) you must be prepared to move quickly and then immediately start spinning again… otherwise you’ll literally listen to the “hiss” as the extract eats away at the meringue. Some extracts are worse than others… but as long as you begin the whipping immediately, it will be ok.

Next add the 3 tablespoons of sugar. If dumped in quickly, the sugar would collapse the meringue. So while it is spinning, sprinkle the sugar in slowly and you will retain your volume.

As soon as the last of the sugar is in, stop spinning and confirm you’re done and you still have your volume.

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Prep & Pipe

Prepare a cookie sheet with a piece of parchment paper. Normally I have two cookie sheets for each batch I make, in case one happens to whip up bigger than the others and yields more cookies (which often happens).

I’m not one to give much advice on piping as I’m terrible at it, but I will say this… I recently tried using one of the small silicone piping bags and I found that the meringue collapsed a bit inside it. So whatever bag you use, make sure it’s plenty big to give your meringue plenty of room to breath. We’ve been just putting a tip on a big Ziploc bag and that’s been working great.

After you pipe out the meringues, you can top them (if you want). and then it’s straight to the oven.

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Baking & Resting

Preheat your oven to 200 F. Bake the meringues for 90 minutes. I’ve been in the habit of rotating the trays midway through the bake, but I’m not sure if that’s necessary or not. Just something I tend to do.

This part is the key. After 90 minutes, the meringues might still feel a bit sticky to the touch. And they will NOT come off the parchment if you try to lift one. In short, they won’t seem “done” and your instinct will be to cook them longer.

Fight that instinct.

Instead, once the 90 minutes are up, turn the oven off, open the oven door partially and leave the tray in the oven to cool down. Check it in 10 minutes. The meringues will pop right off the paper and be perfectly crispy and cooked, and not at all browned on the bottom. You do NOT want brown meringues. With savory food, brown = flavor. With meringues? Brown = burnt.

Flavor #1: Pina Colada

Again, the flavor combinations you can make off this basic recipe are endless. But I thought I’d share three different ones I came up with this week, to give you some ideas.

For these Pina Colada cookies I used 1/4 tsp of both pineapple and coconut extract and one drop of yellow food dye. Colors and flavors will intensify with baking, so you don’t need to go overboard with anything.

For the topping I toasted two tablespoons of unsweetened coconut flakes in a pan with 1/2 tsp of granulated sugar (and the same amount of tap water). Once the coconut was nice and golden brown I removed it and ran gave it a few short pulses through the food processor, just so there weren’t any more gigantic flakes.

With all toppings, have them prepared BEFORE you pipe, so you’re ready to sprinkle them on immediately and then right into the oven.

Calorie-wise, most toppings add 1 calorie to the cookies (if that). And because some times a batch yields 30 cookies, and sometimes 45… I’ve decided to generalize and call all cookies 5 calories, even though there really is a range of 4-6 if you want to get technical.

Flavor #2: Birthday Cake

I found some wonderfully unique flavor extracts on Amazon from a company called Bakto. They have about 30 or so flavors, and you can order individual extracts or a variety pack where you select your flavors. I thought selecting “birthday cake” was a natural for a meringue cookie. And I was right. I can tell already this will be a go-to favorite.

It was very simple. 1/2 tsp of the birthday cake extract, and topped with a few rainbow sprinkles. It really doesn’t have to be that much more complicated than that!

Flavor #3: Mint Chocolate Chip

A few reasons why I wanted to share this one. First, it’s another Batko extract. Not a mint extract, but a chocolate-mint extract. Really has a nice taste and worth checking out.

And next because I then added 1 tablespoons of mini chocolate chips. You only want to add about 5 mini chips per meringue, however, to keep within the rules of 1 calorie topping… so that’s the more important number (because you might have a smaller or larger yield from a particular batch).

But the bigger note is this – the only reason it works adding things like chocolate chips is that, because we are baking at 200 F, the oven never gets hot enough to melt the item and break down it’s shape.

It really allows you to be creative when it comes to flavor and topping combinations!

A Few Notes…

For those curious, you certainly can use confectioner’s sugar instead of granulated sugar in this recipe. In making some flavored aquafaba whipped creams I’ve used that and it works really well. I’ve tried it with meringues, however, and personally preferred the sweetness level from the granulated sugar preparations.

In addition, I have not personally tried a monkfruit sugar substitute like Swerve yet, but in its granulated form I see no reason why I wouldn’t work. I have a bag just for the purposes of trying it soon. But if someone wants to test this out and let me know how it goes, post a comment or shoot me an e-mail… I’m curious!

Colder is normally better when trying to add air into something. So whether you want to take the extra step of putting your mixing bowl in the freezer for 10 minutes before you begin, I highly recommend that you at least store your unused aquafaba in the fridge while working on each flavor variety. I’m sure this would be especially true in warmer weather.

Oh and as far as I understand it, if you wanted to use your aquafaba over several days, I believe as long as you keep it refrigerated in an airtight container, it’s good for at least 2-3 days.

Updates

As I’ve been making these with a great deal of frequency, I’ve changed a few things. First, while you can still make three batches per one can of chic peas (3/4 cup of aquafaba) I’ve been now making FOUR batches from that same yield. Keeping the recipe the same but using just under 1/4 cup of aquafaba as the liquid amount. The reason for the change is that, as I’ve gotten better and better and keeping volume in the mixture, I’d often have more batter than I could use and run out of space on the baking sheets. So by going to four batches that now brought me to four batches, with average yields of about 80-90 small meringues PER batch! That drops the calories down to 2-3 calories per meringue!!! Two calories for meringues with sugar or sprinkles,