— Cecilia Litvak

Aquafaba is a term that was coined by a Frenchman, and it really just means bean water. Chickpea water, the liquid that the chickpeas have cooked in, is the most reliable, although any bean will probably make meringue if you treat it correctly. Of course, one of my students wanted to make a purple meringue, and she used black beans, had a little trouble with it. Let's say it was interesting. So, the original recipes early on said, "Take a can of chickpeas, preferably one that is salt free, drain it, put the liquid into your mixer, start mixing, and make meringue." Well, that's not precise enough, and I wanted to codify the recipe that we use. I want everybody to be successful, and so I understood that it seemed like most cans of chickpeas had between two thirds of a cup and three quarters of a cup of liquid, of aquafaba. I have discovered over time that reducing it, which means boiling this or simmering and reducing the amount of liquid to a half a cup, worked really well. So reduce it, chill it, and then start working with it. And I don't do that a little at a time, I do a lot at a time. When you are working with chickpeas from dried chickpeas, which is what I prefer to do, and you cook them with a piece of kombu seaweed, which helps make all beans more digestible, but it makes a stronger aquafaba as well. You don't salt at all. And when the chickpeas are soft, are ready, you drain them off and then I put the liquid, which is a lot more than a can of liquid, right, back into my Instant Pot and put it on a soup setting and let it reduce. And in that case, I'm not reducing a quarter to a third of a percent of the liquid. I'm reducing to at least a half, if not more. And how do I know when it's ready? I take a little bit out. I have lots of pinch cups. Put it in. It should be viscous, like an egg white. Then you make meringue the proper way. Your bowl and your whisk are perfectly clean. I use cream of tartar, which you would use if you're making an egg white meringue, and add the sugar, the super fine sugar, very slowly, and beat it and beat it and beat it. Unlike egg white meringue, you don't have to worry about overbeating aquafaba. Now, it will hold. I have made pavlovas, I do aquafaba, I've made cookies. But over time, this isn't something that you can really do way ahead if you're using it as a topping. The liquid starts weeping out underneath the meringue. And it is used to make delicate cookies. But commercially, people are using something called potato protein. I actually have some in my fridge. Not in my fridge, in my spice drawer. So it is more stable. They're not exactly the same. And I just recently heard about using aquafaba and dissolving some potato protein in it. So I think that is up to you. If I had a bakery, I might be using the potato protein, but I'm very happy with the aquafaba. So I hope that answers your question.