Memories of holidays past embrace the delicate confections of meringue that my Mommy would make for each Christmas. We simply called them “Kisses” although I’ve since learned that most people refer to them as Forgotten Kisses. Here is my attempt from yesterday to make the minty pink and green Forgotten Kisses with mini-chocolate chip as I remembered them. It didn’t turn out exactly as I planned, but I might also have discovered something even better.
In keeping with my usual fearlessness in making substitutions if necessary to accomplish a cooking objective, I couldn’t find the mint flavoring and mini-chocolate chips I thought I already had on hand. Oh well. I figured a quick trip to the grocery store would fix that. Unfortunately, my local No-Winn Dixie had neither. I bought some clear Creme de Menthe liqueur (a huge bottle just to get a couple of teaspoons worth!) and a bag of Ghirardelli bittersweet dark chocolate chips (there was only one bag left at the store, so at least I was not tempted to get more, lol).
The ingredients are simple and drop cookies are about the easiest type of cookie you can make. Here is an outline of the ingredients and assembly steps from yesterday’s cooking adventure. Enjoy!
Minty Pink and Green Forgotten Kisses with Ghirardelli Chocolate Chips
Ingredients
whites from 4 eggs
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 cup white sugar
2 teaspoons Creme de Menthe liqueur
1 – 11.5 oz bag Ghiardelli cups bittersweet chocolate chips
few drops of red food coloring
few drops of green food coloring
Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Line 3 large cookie sheets with waxed paper cut to size.
Separate whites from yolks. Set aside yolks for use in something else. Put whites into mixer bowl and let come to near room temperature.
With electric mixer and wire wisk attachment, beat egg whites until frothy.
Add cream of tartar to egg whites and beat the mixture until stiff.
Add sugar slowly, about 2 tablespoons at a time, and beat in thoroughly after each addition.
Continue to beat until mixture is glossy. Stir in Creme de Menthe.
With rubber spatula, fold in chocolate chips.
Put about half of mixture in a different bowl. Tint mixture in one of the bowls with red food coloring. Tint the other with green food coloring.
For each cookie, drop a heaping teasponful of the mixture onto a cookie sheet. Leave a bit of space between cookies for expansion and airflow.
Put a tray in the oven and bake for about 20 – 25 minutes, or until just barely starting to brown and become dry and crunchy. Repeat with each of the other trays.
Meantime, let each tray cool somewhat and then remove cookies to a wire rack.
After completely cooled and dried, store in a tightly sealed container or zipper bag. On the other hand, they probably won’t last long enough to store.
Makes about 90 festive meringue cookies. The red and green colors suggested in this recipe are for the Christmas holidays. Feel free to vary the colors for other holidays and special events such as Halloween, school colors for homecoming, etc.
TIP: If possible, make Kisses on a dry day. If it is humid, the meringue is more likely to “wilt”, and the cookies might tend to flatten out and lose their crispness.
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The Creme de Menthe liqueur did not make the cookies as minty-flavored as I would have liked. But that might have been because the taste was overpowered by the fantastic aroma and taste of chocolate (i.e. 60% cacao Ghirardelli rather than the normal Nestles semi-sweet chocolate chip variety). No one can turn down good chocolate though. So even though these are not quite the traditional ones as I remember, they won’t last long.
p.s. Some people also just turn the oven heat off immediately and “forget” the cookies for several hours. But this is not practical if doing a larger batch like this that takes more than two large trays and you have only one oven.
p.p.s. Now what do you suggest I use those egg yolks for? I am thinking egg custard or bread pudding? Other ideas?