Preheat your oven to 150 C/fan 130 C- 300 F-Gas Mark 2. Seperate your egg whites carefully, see tips.
Whip up the egg whites in a free standing mixer or mixing bowl and electric whisk. Whisk until frothy and quite stiff.
Add the sugar by the tablespoon. It is quite a pain but necessary. Whip until the meringue is very stiff and glossy. About five minutes.
Using a bowl on a lined, (I use bake o glide but baking paper is easier to remove), baking tray pile the meringue around the bowl in a circle. Then carefully remove the bowl. Your fingers will get covered in meringue but sculpt the meringue back afterwards. Flatten the top of the pavlova a little to form a wide enough platform for the berries and cream.
Bake in the oven for an hour and fifteen minutes. Remove and leave to cool gently. If poss leave it in the oven after you have switched it off and let it cool there.
In a saucepan place the frozen berries and the 50 grams of caster sugar.Heat gently until the sugar has melted. Taste to see if more sugar is needed. Allow to cool and add the raspberries.
Whip the cream until soft peaks. Be careful not to over whip.
Once the pavlova is cool, carefully peel off the liner and transfer to serving platter. Be brave! The cream will hide a multitude of sins.
Carefully pile on the cream, followed by the berries. If you are serving later in the day, leave the berries off until then or they may bleed like a drunken women's lipstick (mine) into the cream.
Apply Most Of It To Face
Notes
Break your egg whites into separate bowls as you separate each egg one at a time. This will save all your remaining whites from getting contaminated if your egg yolk breaks as you are separating.
Make sure you whisk the egg whites and sugar until they are super thick and shiny.
Don't stir the berries too much in the pan.
Use fresh raspberries to increase the pavlovas curb appeal!
To get ahead make your christmas pavlova 24 hours ahead and decorate when you are ready to serve.
All nutritional information is only a guideline and approximate.