Pavlova with fresh fruit ⋆ Basic recipe for pavlova + pastry cream

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A pavlova is a pastry or cake based on egg white foam. It is wonderfully brittle and airy and also contains no fat. With the filling — or rather the topping — of the pavlova you can vary to your heart's content. I usually use a layer of pastry cream with fresh fruit on top. This is how it becomes a delicious summer pastry!

You can also choose to use chocolate, hazelnut cream or, for example, butter cream. On top you can go wild with gingerbread cookies, chocolates, nuts... you can think of it so crazy! In this article I give you the easy recipe for the pavlova and my filling of cream and fresh fruit.

This recipe is for one large pavlova, or make 6 small ones! Do you bake a big one? Then keep the baking time of 2,5 hours. Small pavlovas will be well dried after an hour and a half.

pavlova easy recipe pastry cream recipe fresh fruit meringue

Ingredients:

For the pavlova:

3 proteins
150 g sugar
1 tsp lemon juice
2 tsp custard powder or cornflour

For the pastry cream:

65 g sugar
1 packet of vanilla-flavored sugar
3 egg yolks
35 gr flour
350 ml (whole) milk

And further…
Strawberries, banana, orange, watermelon & green apple – diced

Preparation of the pavlova

Take a large, grease-free bowl and beat the egg whites with the sugar, lemon juice and custard powder until stiff. This is the base for the pavlova.

Now preheat the oven to 100°C and line a baking tray with baking paper. Pour the batter for the pavlova into the center of the baking tray and spread it with a spatula to a circle of about 20 centimeters. It is best to make the edges quite a bit thicker than the center piece, so that after baking you have a nice 'bowl' to put your filling in.

Bake the pavlova for about 2,5 hours until done and dry. Then let it cool to room temperature.

Making pastry cream

When the pavlova is in the oven, make the pastry cream. This is done as follows: Mix the sugar, vanilla sugar and egg yolks. Add the flour and stir until all the flour is incorporated.

Heat a saucepan over medium heat and add the milk. Let the milk boil for a while and then turn off the heat. Add a little of the hot milk to the egg mixture and stir well. Then add the rest of the hot milk little by little, while you keep stirring well.

Then pour the mixture back into the pan and turn the heat back on. Bring the mixture to a boil while continuing to stir well. Let the cream boil until it thickens a bit. The aim is for the cream to be as thick as custard.

decorating pavlova

When the pavlova and the pastry cream are well cold, you can put together the cake. Note: the bottom of the pavlova cannot withstand moisture well. So only put together the cake when you are going to eat it! Divide the pastry cream over the pavlova and decorate it with the chopped fruit. Enjoy your dinner!