Aquafaba meringues

Aquafaba is one of the most exciting vegan food discoveries of recent years. The name simply means bean water and is the starchy water that is drained from cooked pulses, but most commonly chickpeas. This liquid contains proteins from the pulses and can therefore be used in many of the ways in which egg whites are used. New applications are being discovered all the time, and one of the most exciting is that it can be whipped to high soft peaks, making vegan meringues a reality.

While aquafaba is easy to use, you can run into difficulties if it’s the wrong consistency, so the basic rule of thumb is that it should be similar to that of egg whites. The liquid drained from good-quality canned or jarred chickpeas has good viscosity and should fit the bill. We’ve experimented with lots of different methods using cider vinegar, cornflour and so on, but have found that the plain caster sugar approach works the best.