Winning, Part III

A couple of years ago, Randy won the grand prize at the ward Men's Gourmet Dinner Potluck. This was rather miraculous, because I was out of town and couldn't even coach him. Randy has so many great qualities, but he's really not too good in the kitchen. He likes to think he's kind of a "breakfast specialist." His biggest problem seems to be multi-tasking. We usually end up with toast that is way too brown, probably because we're still using the toaster we bought for $1.50 at a garage sale 17 years ago, which has to be manually popped up. By the time he remembers to pop the toast up, it is time to turn the "over easy" eggs. When he remembers the toast again, it is already cold, so it has three or four blobs of cold butter on it. While he's buttering the toast, the over-easy fried eggs overcook to the hard stage. Nothing else goes wrong, because that's really all there is. But, I do love my man dearly. He gets A+ in almost everything -- nobody comes much closer to "perfect" than he does. Anyway, he entered the Dessert category and won. No prize, but lots of praise. Here's the recipe for his Schaumtorte.

Schaumtorte

1 cup egg whites
1 t. vinegar
1/2 t. cream of tartar
Combine and beat very stiff at high speed. Add 2 cups sugar a little at a time, keeping mixer at high speed.
Spread in 2 well-buttered pyrex pie pans.
Bake at 300 degrees for 10 minutes. Reduce heat to 250 degrees and bake another 30 minutes.
Turn oven off and allow meringue shells to cool in oven.

When serving, remove from pans and place on platter. Fill with fresh fruit (peaches, raspberries or strawberries),
which have been sweetened with sugar to taste.
Whip 1 pint heavy cream (1 c. per pie) with 2 Tablespoons sugar and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Spread over fruit.
Refrigerate for several hours before serving.