12 Days of Prunemas: Stacked Pavlova with White Chocolate Prune Whip (Gluten Free)
Day 12 of Prune Christmas - a Twelfth Night Showstopper for your party table.
This is a post for all subscribers sponsored by CAPrunes. It is the twelfth and FINAL of 12 posts over 12 days, celebrating ways to enjoy delicious prunes.
Have I convinced you to have a party for Twelfth Night yet? What if I tell you it always involved a lot of drinking, a bit of drag, identity switching and a lot of dancing? The big day, because the Magi finally reached baby Jesus after following a star for so many nights?! Or was there more to that story? Are you ready to be visited by La Bafana, the Christmas Witch on the final night of Christmastide? She’ll slip in while you are twirling the night away in traditional fashion no doubt.
How about a showstopper to close out our 12 days of Prunemas? After all that is what Twelfth Night is all about!
This recipe is inspired by my mother in her younger days who was part of a group that among many endeavors had a garden, a yoga studio and a small kitchen. The group also put together a cookbook I have recently found in my mother’s things I inherited when she passed. I remember eating so many of these things long after the group disbanded, and I am excited to update and adapt them for EAT MORE. This cookbook was published internally the same year I was born - kismet!
Sharing them with you over the course of 2025 is one of my goals this year.
The recipe described in the cookbook details a dessert reminiscent of an iles fllotantes - another old school dessert that should be revamped! I’m with Nicola Lamb that more custard is the way forward fellow Americans! I almost always have some sort of custard incarnation on every cake on my menu.
Initially I thought to make a soft prune meringue a top a hot white chocolate drink (in place of the custard), but for Twelfth Night I decided that wasn’t enough! And what if I inverted it?! SO in the STEPPED UP VERSION, below we are baking our egg whites into a meringue with almond extract and cardamom. And stacking her high with a White Chocolate Prune Custard lifted into a whip (really a kind of a mousse) with some mascarpone for body and some heavy cream for lift. Another nod to my mother whose favorite dessert was mascarpone whipped with heavy cream atop lightly sugared strawberries. (This is how I’ve always made my Mascarpone Custard for Tiramisu! And it’s a great accompaniment to so many things.) If you’ve never made custard before, don’t worry we won’t bother with the faff of tempering eggs. Instead we’ll make it like a curd, everything in the bowl at once, over a double boiler and it will be the easiest and most luscious thing you’ll make.
The end result of each bite, is meringue that blossoms with gentle warmth and a citrusy caramelized white chocolate taste to the whip thanks to our star - PRUNES! We’ll finish her with bows to wrap up our #12DaysofPrunemas and have her ready for the big Twelfth Night!
Stacked Pavlova with White Chocolate Prune Whip
Makes one 4 layer Pavlova Tower
Meringue:
500ml egg whites (about 16)
420g cane sugar
530g powdered sugar
15g cornstarch
5g salt
60ml apple cider vinegar
7g cardamom
20g almond extract
Whip:
8 yolks
170g cane sugar
5g salt
32g cornstarch
450g whole milk
225g white chocolate
100g prunes
zest of two citrus, orange or clementine preferably
475g Mascarpone
325g Heavy Whipping Cream
Method:
Being by making the meringue. Preheat oven to 250 degrees Fahrenheit. In the bowl of a stand mixer whip your egg whites on medium till you see small bubbles throughout. Meanwhile stir your cornstarch into your sugar, and then slowly and continuously rain your cane sugar into your egg whites. Continue whipping and add your salt. Then add your powdered sugar the same way you added the cane sugar. Add the apple cider vinegar and turn your mixer to high. Whip for 2 minutes allowing the vinegar to tighten the meringue. Lower the speed and add your cardamon and extract, mixing to combine.
Prepare sheet trays with parchment paper, and use a spatula and offset spatula to make 4 rounds - 8 inches, 6 inches, 4 inches and 2 inches. Load the remaining meringue into a piping bag, with any tip you like or simply cut off the tip to form a simple round. Pipe bows or other shapes.
Bake bows, your two smallest rounds and other small baubles for 40 mins. Bake remaining two rounds for another 20 minutes. Meringue should be baked through, sound hollow when tapped, and lift easily from your parchment.
Make your whip. In a medium sized metal bowl add your yolks, sugar, cornstarch, salt and milk. In another bowl place your white chocolate, prunes and zest, and place a fine mesh sieve on top. Place bowl over a medium pot with 2 inches of simmering water. Whisk mixture continuously over your double boiler till it thickens and you can see the tracks of your whisk in your wake. Pour your hot thick custard through the sieve onto your chocolate and prunes. Allow to sit for 2 minutes to warm the chocolate through. Use an immersion blender to blend everything together. Put a piece of parchment or plastic onto the surface of the custard and move to your fridge to chill completely.
Once chilled move to the bowl of a stand mixer and add in mascarpone, whip till thickened. Add heavy cream and whip till lifted.
Build. Begin with your largest meringue layer and place on a cake stand or serving plate. Top with a generous layer of prune whip. Add the next layer of meringue. Continue stacking with custard and meringue until fully built. Adorn with bows, gold leaf and any other baubles.
Meringue can sit at room temperature for 2-3 hours on a cold night. Enjoy!
Note: I made a tower! But meringue can hold so many shapes. Feel free to riff on the main structure or just the adornments. Make different shapes and baubles. Make her your own! She should be a bit of a messy beauty, so don’t get bogged down in elusive ‘perfection’.
Can be made a day ahead and stored in your fridge. If you make less bows you could stack this five layers high! Dream Big.
If you want to add in a last Christmastide tradition, hide a bean and a pea in your tower. Whoever finds the bean is the King of the evening and whoever finds the pea is Queen!
Thats it! That’s a wrap on 12 days of Christmas celebrating Prunes! Thank you for being along for the ride. There will be a short break and I’ll be back with more recipes soon.
Happy Twelfth Night!
xoxox
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Lovely dessert and sounds tasty too!