I have been looking at pictures of cakes decorated with meringue flowers and I think I would like to try this. I know there are different meringues--French, Swiss, Italian. I'm not sure which to use.
I would like the meringue flowers, piped and baked on a sheet, to be crisp but king of chewy. I don't want the soft meringue that is usually found on lemon meringue pies, nor do I want the fairly hard and crunchy kind, such as the meringue "cookies" that one can buy in a plastic tub in grocery stores.
I would appreciate any advice you can give me to get the results that I would like. Thanks.
Shanter
Do you have a pic as an example that I can refer to? There are pipeable meringues out there, but I've never seen flowers done with it.
Theresa 
There was a cake on Martha Stewart Weddings that had spiral rose meringue flowers on it, but all I can find is the cupcake version...
http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/recipe/swiss-meringue-roses
Recipe and all.
Swiss Meringue is harder than French Meringue. Italian Meringue is harder than Swiss.
The addition of ground nuts makes meringue chewy [japonaise meringue] but the piped flowers would have a gritty texture ..
The meringue must be beaten until stiff and glossy with all the sugar completely dissolved.
MS has meringue powder added so that it can be piped into flowers. This also should make the flowers harder and drier ..
There was a cake on Martha Stewart Weddings that had spiral rose meringue flowers on it, but all I can find is the cupcake version...
http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/recipe/swiss-meringue-roses
Recipe and all.
I remember that one - it's called ribbon rose wedding cake. There's another one I just spotted, called meringue bouquet wedding cake, that looks like it has a couple of different flowers on it.
Theresa
I am showing links to pictures showing cakes decorated with meringue flowers. There are the ones that interest me.
http://vanillaorchidcakes.com/meringue%20flowers%202.JPG
http://images.marthastewart.com/images/content/pub/weddings/1998Q2/wed_sf98_cakes_03_l.jpg
http://www.celebrationgeneration.com/BlogPics/MeringueDetail1.jpg
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_I-lCs2DdSnQ/S9eTdJ4xYOI/AAAAAAAAASY/xs8bqYgRIjo/s1600/DSC_0265_edited-1-sign.jpg
Shanter
This is the Martha Stewart piped roses cake. She called it a different name, ribbon roses, that's why it's hard to find.
http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/recipe/ribbon-rose-cake
Just found the baked meringue flowers at Martha Stewart site:
http://www.marthastewart.com/article/baked-meringue-bouquet
Swiss Meringue is harder than French Meringue. Italian Meringue is harder than Swiss.
The addition of ground nuts makes meringue chewy [japonaise meringue] but the piped flowers would have a gritty texture ..
The meringue must be beaten until stiff and glossy with all the sugar completely dissolved.
MS has meringue powder added so that it can be piped into flowers. This also should make the flowers harder and drier ..
Thanks, Auzzi! That's very valuable information.
Shanter
Quote by @%username% on %date%
%body%