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Butter Meringue Nuts

Source of Recipe

From "The Pastry Queen Christmas" by Rebecca Rather


Recipe Introduction

"These make distinctive Christmas gifts for teachers, friends, or neighbors. Buy attractive, inexpensive holiday mugs or glass bowls and fill them with these sweetly addicting nuts. Set each bowl in the center of a large square of plastic wrap, gather the wrap in a bunch on top of the container, and tie the wrap together with a colorful ribbon. Add a gift tag. For an even more inexpensive alternative, pack the nuts in small cellophane bags, tie with ribbon, and add a gift tag. Patricia Oresman, my co-author's mother, used to make these nuts every Christmas season; she'd pack them in clean mayonnaise jars, cover the screw-on tops with decorative holiday tape, and give them out to friends and family. She lost the original recipe years ago, but believes she cut it out of a magazine sometime in the early sixties."

List of Ingredients

• 4 cups (16 ounces) whole pecans
• 2 cups (8 ounces) blanched almonds
• ½ cup (1 stick) salted butter
• 2 large egg whites
• Dash of kosher salt
• 1 cup sugar


Recipe

Preheat the oven to 325°F.
Spread the nuts on a large rimmed baking sheet and toast them until lightly brown and fragrant, 7 to 9 minutes. Transfer the nuts to a large bowl.

Place the butter on the rimmed baking sheet and return it to the oven to melt. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Add the salt, then beat the sugar into the egg mixture, about ¼ cup at a time. Gently stir the nuts into the meringue mixture.

Evenly spread the nut mixture on the baking sheet with the melted butter. Bake for 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes to ensure that the butter is evenly distributed among all the nuts. The nuts are done when all of the butter has been absorbed and the meringue coating is a light brown. Remove from the oven and let cool completely. Store the nuts in an airtight container for up to 1 week.

Makes about 8 cups.