Daring Bakers First Challenge!! Marquise on Meringue!

The May 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Emma of CookCraftGrow and Jenny of Purple House Dirt. They chose to challenge everyone to make a Chocolate Marquise. The inspiration for this recipe comes from a dessert they prepared at a restaurant in Seattle.

As it was my first Daring Bakers challenge, i was a little nervous. Seeing the quality of other members' creations was quite intimidating, but i had fun :D  My Variation to the recipe was I made a dark choc marquise with a touch of cinnamon, nutmeg and brandy, a vanilla bean meringue, brandy caramel(which was too delicious for words!), cinnamon and nutmeg toasted macadamia's and added some chunks of roast pumpkin tossed in cinnamon and nutmeg to give it a pumpkin pie type flavour. All in all it was pretty tasty and i was happy with my first challenge :D

the oven roasted macadamias

dee-licious!!



using a lighter to caramelise my meringue, the lengths you go to when you cant be bothered to buy a blowtorch!


 

my finished product :)