Pavlova Christmas Tree

If you’re looking for a festive dessert to blow your guests away, then look no further than this Pavlova Christmas Tree! With its yummy vegan meringue and delicious strawberry layers, it’ll bring holiday cheer to your Christmas party!

Pavlova Christmas Tree

Difficulty: Medium • 15 Servings • Total Time: 4 Hours

Ingredients:

• 2 (14oz) canned chickpeas
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 4 tsp cornstarch
• 4 tsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 cups heavy cream
• ½ cup powdered sugar, sifted
• 2 qt strawberries
• 1 bunch rosemary
• Gold star decoration
• More powdered sugar for sprinkling

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Strain chickpeas so aquafaba liquid is separated. Whip aquafaba until soft peaks form. Combine sugar with cornstarch. Stream into aquafaba while whisking. 
3. Once the meringue is at stiff peaks mix in lemon juice and vanilla extract. Transfer to a piping bag fitted with a large open star tip.
4. Prepare parchment templates. You’ll need to draw 7 rounds gradually increasing in size with a black marker. Good sizes would be doing circles with a radius of 2cm, 3.5cm, 5cm, 6.5cm, 8cm, 9.5cm, and 11cm. Flip parchment over so the marker is on the underside of the paper.
5. Pipe rounds of meringue and finish with a braided border so that sides are more elevated than the center. Repeat with all circle sizes.
6. Bake all pavlovas at 200F for 2 hours. Allow to continue dehydrating for another hour in the turned off oven. Remove and peel from parchment. Set aside.
7. Whip cream with powdered sugar until stiff peaks form. Transfer to a piping bag fitted with a medium size open star tip.
8. Cut 1 quart of strawberries in half. Set aside. With the other quart, remove stems and then blend into a puree. Transfer puree into a pouring vessel
9. To assemble pavlova, layer the pavlova disks in the following order: beginning with the largest round on the bottom. Pipe a round of cream and leave a 1” border. Press strawberry halves along outside of the cream. Drizzle on some strawberry puree in the center. Top the strawberry halves with more cream to adhere to the next layer of pavlova. Repeat with remaining pavlova disks (starting with the second largest all the way to the smallest round) until all are completely assembled.
10. Decorate with sprigs of rosemary and finally insert a gold star at the top to complete the Christmas tree. Finish off with a sprinkling of powdered sugar to emulate “snow”. Enjoy!