Chocolate Swirled Meringue Cookies

These chocolate swirled meringue cookies are made from just 5 ingredients. Delightfully crisp on the outside with a melt-in-your-mouth texture inside, these naturally gluten free chocolate meringues are simply irresistible. Follow the recipe closely because these require precision. Use my video tutorial, step-by-step photos, and success tips as your guide.

This recipe is part of my annual holiday cookie countdown called Sally’s Cookie Palooza!

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What are Meringues?

Though they’re enjoyed throughout the year, meringues are extra special on holiday cookie trays. Made mostly from egg whites and sugar, meringue cookies are piped onto baking sheets and baked at a low temperature for a considerably longer time than most other cookie recipes. The low temperature guarantees the shaped meringues won’t immediately melt. Rather, they’ll crisp up on the edges while remaining puffy, light, and cloud-like in the centers. Think of a meringue cookie as an extra mini pavlova. Perfect for tea parties, paired with coffee or hot chocolate, and lovely as a decoration on cakes! 🙂 They’re also a gluten free dessert recipe—it’s always nice to have a gluten free option or two in your usual lineup of Christmas cookies!

Though I have a recipe for classic fairy-like meringues in Sally’s Cookie Addiction, I wanted to publish a meringue cookie recipe with swirls of real chocolate. If you’ve enjoyed regular meringues, wait until you taste them with chocolate baked and swirled throughout.

These Chocolate Swirled Meringue Cookies Are:

• Light-as-air
• Sweet & swirled
• Naturally gluten free
• Delicate, yet crisp
• Swirled with real chocolate
• Topped with sprinkles

Each bite is light, yet irresistibly crisp. The centers are hollow in spots and literally melt in your mouth. That’s why these cookies have been loved for so long—they’re just that good.

Meringue Ingredients

1. Egg Whites: Beaten into stiff peaks, egg whites are the base of meringue cookies. Just as I recommend when making French macarons, use fresh eggs instead of carton egg whites. Here are all my recipes using egg yolks. Eggs separate much easier when they’re cold, but room temperature egg whites whip into a higher volume. Separate the eggs right out of the refrigerator, then let the egg whites sit for about 30 minutes before starting.
2. Cream of Tartar: The acidity in this crucial ingredient helps the egg whites hold onto air and, like the sugar, helps prevent the egg whites from collapsing. If you’re making snickerdoodles or angel food cake, you already have this ingredient on hand. It’s sold with the spices. Because the chocolate can weigh down the batter, I use a little more cream of tartar in today’s recipe than the recipe in my cookbook.
3. Salt: Salt offsets the sweetness.
4. Sugar: Without sugar, the protein molecules in egg whites will collapse. Additionally, sugar helps achieve the delightfully crisp texture. (Sugar is so much more than a sweetener!) You can use regular granulated sugar in this meringue cookie recipe.
5. Chocolate: You need 2 ounces of pure melted chocolate. Pick up a 4 ounce baking chocolate bar, such as Bakers or Ghirardelli, then melt half of it. You can even melt the leftover 2 ounces and dip your cooled meringues into it. No waste!

I strongly recommend using an egg separator (isn’t it cute?!). You don’t want any egg yolks in the bowl—the slightest drop of fat will prevent the egg whites from properly stabilizing. An egg separator is an inexpensive but super handy tool in the kitchen.

How to Make Chocolate Swirled Meringue Cookies

1. Melt the chocolate. I recommend doing this first because the chocolate needs to cool down before folding into the meringue batter.
2. Beat the egg whites, cream of tartar, and salt together. On high speed, beat these ingredients into soft peaks, pictured below on the left.
3. Gradually add the sugar. Beat on high speed into stiff peaks. Stiff peaks hold their point when you lift up the whisk attachment. See picture below on the right.
4. Fold in the melted chocolate. You want swirls all throughout the batter.
5. Pipe onto baking sheets. I recommend using an open star tip and piping little 1.5 inch swirls. You can watch me do this in the video tutorial above. Feel free to add sprinkles on top of the piped cookies.
6. Bake at a low temperature. These cookies take 1 and 1/2 hours at 250°F (121°C).
7. Partially cool the meringues in the oven. Turn off the oven and let the cookies sit in the cooling oven for about 30 minutes.
8. Cool the meringues completely. Remove meringues from the oven. They can cool completely right on the baking sheets.

Soft peaks, then stiff peaks:

Fold in the chocolate:

You can even drizzle some of the melted chocolate right into the open piping bag before spooning in the meringue batter. That’s what I did for this particular batch:

Success Tips for Chocolate Swirled Meringue Cookies

1. No fat in the mixing bowl. Though we’ll add chocolate to the batter after the egg whites have reached stiff peaks, we can’t have ANY fat in the mixture prior to that. As you may remember from my lemon meringue pie, fat will prevent the egg whites from reaching those crucial peaks. Use a glass or metal mixing bowl. (Plastic can hold onto fat residue.) Wipe your mixing bowl completely clean and use an egg separator. Separate the egg whites one at a time and place the egg white in the mixing bowl before separating the next. This way, if a yolk breaks in one of them, you don’t waste the whole batch. (If an egg yolk breaks, use that for scrambled eggs the next morning!)
2. Follow the recipe closely. Each ingredient is crucial. No substitutions.
3. Don’t make meringues on a humid day. Weather can affect how your meringues set up before and during baking. Make meringues on a dry day to help guarantee they’ll beat into stiff peaks and crisp up in the oven.

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