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How to beat egg whites

Beat egg whites is very common in cooking and pastry, here are some tips to get there easily.

557 K 3.5/5 (109 reviews)

5 min.

Easy

0.40 €

4 eggs whites

2 Ingredients

Last modified on: February 21^th 2011

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For 4 eggs whites, you will need:

1 4 egg whites
2 ½ teaspoon lemon juice

Change these quantities to make:

2 eggs whites 4 eggs whites 8 eggs whites 12 eggs whites

Change measures:

Metric

Metric weight Metric volumes

Times for this recipe

Preparation: 5 min.

Step by step recipe

Stage 1 - 5 min.

They should be beaten at high speed.

If they are for savoury or neutral preparations (i.e. without sugar), add a teaspoon of lemon juice before starting to beat to prevent them "going grainy" which can happen with very fresh egg whites.

If they are for sweet preparations (for meringues for example), incorporate 2 tablespoons of caster sugar from the total sugar you plan to add, halfway through beating, which makes it much easier to beat and to incorporate the remaining sugar.

Stage 2

Beating egg whites incorporates air, which creates a foam made up of ever smaller bubbles of air and drops of white (albumen + water), see the microscope photo on right.

This fact give us some rules for egg whites:

Fresh egg whites give better results that old ones, because they contain more water.
If you add water or a liquid which contains some (fruit juice, ...) to egg whites to be beaten, you will have a greater volume of foam.
Fat is the enemy when beating egg whites, because it obstructs or prevents the formation of foam, so it's necessary to be sure that the egg whites contain no traces of yolk (not a drop), and that the container that you're going to use is completely clean (be particularly careful with plastic bowls).

Keeping: 1 hour bfore use.

Source: Home made.

Nutritional information

	Proteins (gr)	Carbohydrates (gr)	Fats (gr)	Energy value (in k-calories)	Energy value (in k-joules)
Whole recipe	6 RDI=2 %	0	0	30 RDI=1 %	110 RDI: 1 %
Per 100 g	4 RDI=2 %	0	0	20 RDI=1 %	90 RDI: 1 %
Per egg whites	1 RDI=1 %	0	0	6 RDI=0 %	30 RDI: 0 %

The % figures are calculated in relation to the Recommended Dietary Intake , or RDI of 2,000 k-calories (or 8,400 k-joules) per day for a woman Change to a man

Possible allergens in this recipe: egg

How much will it cost?

For 4 eggs whites : 0.40 €
Per egg whites : 0.10 €

Change currency:

Note: Be careful, these prices are only an estimate, you can consult the table of prices by ingredients used for this estimate.

This recipe uses (among others)

Egg white

Like these other recipes: Almond dacquoise, Like MaronSui's, Macarons (the original French macaroons) , Hazelnut and orange cake, Cigarettes Russes (Piroulines), ... See them all 52

Lemon juice

Like these other recipes: Nanou's apple and almond cake, Hollandaise sauce, Royal icing, Green parsley tahini sauce, Cubed salad, ... See them all 72

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