This is a festive take on one of my favorite desserts, pavlova. The meringue is piped into a wreath shape and topped with Christmas-colored fruits. I’ve seen a lot of recipes that show red currants and while I’d love to use them, they aren’t in season until summer. This has fresh raspberries, pomegranate seeds and mint. I really love the crunch of the arils so I was generous with those. Sugared cranberries would also be fitting. For extra flavor, a surprise layer of Meyer lemon curd underneath the sweetened whipped cream.

I was inspired to make my own mince pies after eating them in London. From what I’ve researched, bakeries will often prepare the mincemeat filling months, sometimes years ahead, to really develop the flavor. While I’d love to try that one day, I decided to shortcut for my first bake, and bought a jar from a gourmet shop while in London.

I love browning butter for baked goods, but find many recipes will call for that step and the results don’t truly highlight the nutty flavor that well. I find it best showcased in a shortbread cookie, where there are not a lot of competing ingredients, just a bit of vanilla to enhance the overall sweetness. This is a sandy, crisp shortbread, which gets a bit of crumbly texture from the added rice flour. I prefer this over using cornstarch which leans more chalky to me. Also note, the brown butter gives the cookies a darker appearance because of the caramelization. My sister said they look like Biscoff. 🙂