Cappuccino Pavlova Cracking

Asked by moiracretney. Answered on 16th May 2015

Full question

My Cappucino Pavlova meringue looked fine until about twenty minutes after I had turned the oven off, then it spread out and became thinner and cracked at the sides. Can you tell me where I went wrong?

Our answer

Pavlova meringue bases (such as Nigella's Cappucino Pavlova from Nigellissima and on the Nigella website) do sometimes crack as they have a hard crust and a soft interior. As the meringue cools the softer interior may shrink back a little, causing the more brittle outside shell to crack.

From the description it sounds as if the meringue was cooling quite quickly which caused the early cracking and possibly the interior was not quite set, leading the meringue to spread out slighty. If the meringue is cooked then the base should be dry enough to release from the baking parchment lining the baking sheet. If the base is still sticky then bake for another 10 minutes and check again. The meringue also needs to cool slowly so make sure that there are no sudden cold draughts passing over the meringue. Usually this means keeping the oven door shut as the meringue cools. However some new fan ovens blow cold air into the oven once it has been switched off (for rapid cooling) and if your oven is like this then you may need to turn the oven to a very low setting (25c or lower) for 30 minutes or so, before turning the oven off completely, so that the meringue has a chance to cool gradually.