A great dinner party centre piece you can make ahead
Ingredients
For the mulled pears
- 600ml mulled wine, ready made from a bottle
- 6 small, ripe, shapely pears, peeled , quartered and cored
- 50g golden caster sugar
For the pecan and meringue filling
- 225g golden caster sugar
- 1½ tsp cornflour
- 4 large egg whites
- 1½ tsp wine vinegar
- 50g pecan, roughly chopped
- 500g tub Greek yogurt
- 4 tbsp dulce de leche (we used Merchant Gourmet)
- extra toasted pecans (optional)
Method
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Put the wine, pears and sugar in a pan and simmer for 10 mins.
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Heat oven to 160C/140C/gas 3. Draw a 25cm circle on a sheet of baking parchment, then put on a baking sheet. Stir 225g sugar and cornflour together in a jug. Whisk the egg whites until stiff, then whisk in the sugar mixture, a tbsp at a time, until thick and glossy.
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Fold in vinegar and half the nuts, then pile mixture onto the circle, building up the edges to make a ‘nest’. Scatter with rest of pecans then put in oven, turning the temperature down to 150C/fan 130C/gas 2. Bake for 1 hr, then turn oven off and cool inside for 1 hr.