The Art of Whipping Egg Whites: A Guide to Fluffy Texture

When it comes to making a fluffy pie, one of the most crucial steps is whipping egg whites to stiff peaks. This process requires finesse and care, as over-whipping can result in a collapsed texture. To achieve the perfect fold, it's essential to understand the technique involved. "Okay, so when you're like that, you want a whisk or a full fold at this point," explains our expert. "Kind of going like that, going around that's how you do it right. You go around and then through." The key is to incorporate the egg whites gently, without squashing all of the air, which can result in a dense pie.

To achieve this delicate balance, our expert demonstrates the technique of folding. "I would do more like around and then fold and not like through the middle," she explains. "What you don't want to do is just squash all of that air there." By incorporating the egg whites gently, around the perimeter of the bowl, we can maintain the light and airy texture that's essential for a fluffy pie.

Assembling the Pie: A Delicate Process

With the egg whites whipped to perfection, it's time to assemble the pie. "We're just going to then pour it right in," our expert says, as she carefully pours the mixture into a cooled pie crust. The trick is to do this without collapsing the air, which can result in a dense pie.

To ensure that the pie stays light and fluffy, our expert demonstrates the technique of folding again. "I would just sort of fold it in all right," she explains. "That's good." By gently incorporating the pumpkin custard into the egg whites, we can maintain the delicate balance of flavors and textures that make this pie truly special.

Adding the Finishing Touches

With the pie assembled, it's time to add the finishing touches. Our expert demonstrates how to top the pie with whipped cream, using a spatula to create a smooth, even layer. "You don't want to drop this on camera," she jokes, as she carefully pours the whipped cream over the pie.

As they work, our expert and her team discuss the importance of presentation and plating. "I was going to give you a spoon to just do what?" asks our host, referring to a technique used in food styling. The answer is simple: "Maybe just some like yes mellow swooshes." With a final flourish, the pie is complete, and it's clear that the finishing touches have made all the difference.

Tasting and Enjoying

The moment of truth has arrived – it's time to taste the finished pie. Our expert takes a bite, closing her eyes in rapture. "It's so fluffy it's really right," she says, her voice filled with enthusiasm. The team gathers around, eager to try the pie for themselves.

As they slice into the pie, the room fills with oohs and ahhs of delight. The combination of flavors and textures is truly special, and it's clear that this pie has been a labor of love. With its delicate balance of pumpkin and spices, this pie is sure to be a hit at any gathering.

The Art of Whipping Cream: A Final Touch

As the team continues to work on their dessert, they turn their attention to whipping cream. "Let's also like slice onions and see like let's do that," suggests one of our hosts, referring to a technique used in food styling. The answer is simple: "It's like a knife test." With a flourish, the team begins to whip the cream, adding a touch of elegance to their finished pie.

In the end, it's clear that the art of making a fluffy pie is all about attention to detail and finesse. From whipping egg whites to folding delicate mixtures, every step requires care and precision. But when done correctly, the result is truly special – a pie that's both delicious and visually stunning.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthis is gonna be a tag team right um yeah or yeah yeah because i'm not strong enough to do this the whole time no and you beat andy at the famous whisking competition right i did i did how about how badly did you beat andy what was that what happened again wow he just walked away yeah so do you want to present the recipe yes we were making pumpkin chiffon pie today and the the concept being a pumpkin chiffon pie is like a pumpkin mousse it's creamy and silky graham cracker crust because everyone loves graham cracker crust i always kind of felt like pumpkin pie on thanksgiving can get a little sludgy the crust can get a little sort of just kind of damp and not flaky if we all love pumpkin pie how come we only eat it once a year so a traditional pumpkin pie is a pumpkin custard that would have pumpkin puree whole eggs and some sort of dairy whether it be milk heavy cream condensed milk and then that gets baked in the oven traditionally this version of a pumpkin pie the chiffon gets its stability and structure from gelatin which sets it like a jello and then it gets its lightness from whipping egg whites into it so it never goes into the oven and it's eaten cold and sets in the fridge all right first things first graham cracker crust super easy let's open those guys up we have 12 graham crackers i don't know why 12 exactly one pack has nine okay plus three okay and then we need melted butter yeah you're gonna melt the butter i'm making the graham cracker crust so it's nine plus three equals twelve i'm told and then into a uh one of these guys you call these processors right there we go okay so we're just melting butter over here it's six tablespoons of butter not browning it just getting it nice and hot and also while we're doing that into about two tablespoons sugar you can go a little less if you want a little less sweet and am i i'm allowed to talk right i honestly wouldn't go less because in our recipe development and you were there for this at the tasting our crust was a little bit soft and i think that has something to do with the sugar quantity because the sugar makes it crackly and hard in the oven all right pinch or two of salt uh and then you want to just blitz them so they're really fine so not chunky but all the way all the way done okay hot butter coming in hot butter okay no no we're gonna drizzle in we drizzle in the thing yes have you ever made this pie i i just did it like that in a thing no okay so what do we do we look like this i swear to god i've made this pie before and then it just incorporates itself this way and it gets all nice and evenly sandy oh i was just doing it by hand like in a bowl and then we can do like a quick scrape down oh yes you want to get in there guys so we got to get that stuff from the sides so the one another little pastry person trick is using a cup measuring spoon to sort of form the crust right that's like what people do yeah so that way you get like a nice evenly pat down layer the edges of the measuring cup sort of like fit right into the edge of the pie plate so you can get a nice compact even crust all around all right so we have a nice mostly neat crust get it even again i like to go up to the edge then you guys suggested you and solas test kitchen professionals lower temperature longer cooking time right instead of being at 350 for like 15 to 20 minutes we're going to 325 for 20 to 25 so it doesn't get too dark by the time it's nice and crisp so that's in there we are now going to make the custard which is super simple so we're going to use the yolks for the custard which is going to go on the stovetop and cook along with the pumpkin puree a couple of spices and the gelatin and then we're going to reserve the whites to separately whip those and then fold those in to the cooled custard okay and then along with the yolks we're gonna put those in the pot right yeah no no yolks and milk get whisked together oh yes and then you can do the dry mixture over there but we're just whisking the wet ingredients together so that they're incorporated and then these are going to get stirred into the gelatin mixture on the stove and cook so in the gelatin mixture all right so one packet of gelatin right about a scant three-quarter cup sugar and let me just say this doing a tasting in the bonapa test kitchen harder than i expected i'm really glad like you make a pie normally everyone's like oh my god thank you much for this pie it's so amazing here everyone's like how much sugar is in here like the twice is a little salty like zero did you incorporate this and you're like oh my god you people are so unappreciative recipes are great i know sugar i mean cinnamon nutmeg yup but it actually helped a lot so we reduced the over all amount of sugar a pinch of salt how much salt it's a half of half a teaspoon two pinches yeah done so let's go over here now and we're going to start cooking the custard all right so i'm putting this over medium medium-low heat adding the egg yolk and milk mixture to the sugar and spice um and you want to continue whisking so it doesn't curdle right yeah so constantly because otherwise you'll have scrambled eggs yeah we don't want scrambled eggs as much as we love scrambled eggs boss how does gelatin work well that's a really great question typically you would bloom the gelatin in water and we noticed that oh yeah your recipe doesn't call for that the egg whites are on coke so if you do not are not comfortable eating raw eggs the recipe is not for you but if you like caesar salad dressing or if you like a whiskey sour or you like homemade aioli then you're fine yeah yeah so but the egg egg yolks are cooked over heat the egg whites are just whipped without being cooked i don't have to worry about the frothiness do i doesn't really matter no that's just from whisking and that's going to dissipate oh that's looking pretty nice right yeah so it's like if you go like this that it leaves a trail behind which means it's thickened if it were completely liquid it would all just drip off so like that's a good test to do you think we're good yeah and then i'll open up the pumpkin or libby's tried and true i would say yeah for this just basic pumpkin puree you don't want like pumpkin pie mix you don't want the pre-sweetened or flavored and also you only want lippies yeah so then the pumpkin is going to bring the temperature of the custard down a bit but really as we learned it's important that it be cool what you don't want is to cool this completely to like chilled because there's gelatin in there now and if you were to just leave it in the refrigerator for an hour and a half and come back later to add your egg whites it would have set and then you'd have to disturb the set in order to incorporate the egg whites oh yeah and then i don't know what i'm going to do there's my right hand and left hand make sure you get all that out there okay let's check on the pie crust it's been about 20 minutes crust has browned as you can see around the perimeter um and it's dry and set so we'll let this cool now all right so while that's cooling we're going to whip the egg whites so i think that we have you whipping them to like medium peaks and then streaming in the sugar doesn't want to take over sure what's your technique um i do this oh that's how you won the competition yeah andy you want to take some notes do you want to observe and i did i did i did this okay so we're going to do a quarter cup sugar yeah scant little smidge lash or so so you want to stream you go and this kind of helps stabilize them and also sweeten them or correct so this will give them a little bit more structure and then also it'll make them taste like something all right so the original one look at that i might have forgotten to say stiff or soft so sola did soft peaks which ultimately proved to be didn't give enough lift to the final customer yeah so it was a little bit oh what no i'm sorry we're just talking we're just talking about the cross testing process and how important it is to a final recipe all right i'm gonna get the custard because you're almost done okay so we're gonna get this guy out so again you want it cool it doesn't need to be cold correct okay all right here we go so when you're like that you want a whisk or a full fold at this point all right so kind of going like that going around that's how you do it right you go around and then through i would do more like around and then fold and not like through the middle because what you don't want to do is just squash all of the air there okay all right so you incorporated you just spent like five minutes whipping those egg whites to stiff peaks and so you want to be really careful and gentle about the way you incorporate in the pumpkin custard because you don't want to collapse all of that air and that lift that you created because that's what's going to give the pie that fluffy texture so this is how i fold which is around the perimeter of the bowl and then you just sort of fold it in all right that's good all right so then we're just going to then pour it right in we have the crust it's cooled down and then just and it goes i'm worried i'm going to drop this on camera but nope i got it and then get all that out so then just sort of maybe do i need that i don't think i do i need the little spatula what do you want to do i was going to give you a spoon to just do what do you want all right what would you do go ahead if i was if i was looking for a little move movement i would maybe just do some like yes mellow swooshes okay now into the fridge so there you go gorgeous mussolin pie pumpkin chiffon pie into the fridge we stay overnight at least two hours should we go find our swap no because we got a whipped cream first oh god here it goes let's get andy involved oh should we write another column yes we can all compete this time we need bowls right and they all have to be the exact same size and we have to measure out the amount of cream to the vault to the top i would just like to say that i do something called an overhead press and i am lifting over 140 pounds above my head and neither of you do that and that's what i did this morning but go ahead okay i'm not getting this release ran eight miles this morning that is so different i don't care what does it have to do with your overhead presses because it that makes you big and stiff and you're you're like what did you say oh you're excusing yourself you're excusing yourself alone for fun yeah i'm just cooking back hold on a second what hold on there we go excuse me oh he's got an ice the frozen whisk all right let's go we didn't we on your mark get set up okay adam you've switched to like a more delicate back and forth now so many different molly but i'm mostly getting it all over the counter oh andy's doing really well and he's taking the lead one and a half minutes oh okay so i didn't know what to do with the whipped cream i was just gonna serve it at the table and then you were like no we're gonna do it up because this pie it's fine a little plain yeah yeah without it so we decided that we'll top the pie with the whipped cream but leave a little bit of the custard around the edge so you can see what's happening and then we can serve more alongside so this is like a really silly big spoon but just dolloping it nicely some more movement giving it some movement so much movement in this pie okay all right then the sieve this is like the fussiest thing ever for this pie oh see that's nice it's really nice it's like a little nutmeg on top of your eggnog or something it does kind of look like nutmeg oh in kind of a way that i don't like but in a pumpkin spice latte sort of way yeah excellent job molly thank you okay i think that's good these are nice slices you want that one you want to curve do you want a straight one i like that curvy one curve is pretty cool it's like some frank gehry building or something yeah are we tasting i mean it's so fluffy it's really right you expect it to be dense because it's like pumpkin pie pan that's honestly freaking delicious so good all right thanks guys we good i'm good all right we're good wow fine let's keep doing whipping cream let's also like slice onions and see like let's do that it's like a knife test i think i'm going to be fine i love her my little sister her older sister she's older than that i don't know why they they're still talking to me i don't know they keep me talking to methis is gonna be a tag team right um yeah or yeah yeah because i'm not strong enough to do this the whole time no and you beat andy at the famous whisking competition right i did i did how about how badly did you beat andy what was that what happened again wow he just walked away yeah so do you want to present the recipe yes we were making pumpkin chiffon pie today and the the concept being a pumpkin chiffon pie is like a pumpkin mousse it's creamy and silky graham cracker crust because everyone loves graham cracker crust i always kind of felt like pumpkin pie on thanksgiving can get a little sludgy the crust can get a little sort of just kind of damp and not flaky if we all love pumpkin pie how come we only eat it once a year so a traditional pumpkin pie is a pumpkin custard that would have pumpkin puree whole eggs and some sort of dairy whether it be milk heavy cream condensed milk and then that gets baked in the oven traditionally this version of a pumpkin pie the chiffon gets its stability and structure from gelatin which sets it like a jello and then it gets its lightness from whipping egg whites into it so it never goes into the oven and it's eaten cold and sets in the fridge all right first things first graham cracker crust super easy let's open those guys up we have 12 graham crackers i don't know why 12 exactly one pack has nine okay plus three okay and then we need melted butter yeah you're gonna melt the butter i'm making the graham cracker crust so it's nine plus three equals twelve i'm told and then into a uh one of these guys you call these processors right there we go okay so we're just melting butter over here it's six tablespoons of butter not browning it just getting it nice and hot and also while we're doing that into about two tablespoons sugar you can go a little less if you want a little less sweet and am i i'm allowed to talk right i honestly wouldn't go less because in our recipe development and you were there for this at the tasting our crust was a little bit soft and i think that has something to do with the sugar quantity because the sugar makes it crackly and hard in the oven all right pinch or two of salt uh and then you want to just blitz them so they're really fine so not chunky but all the way all the way done okay hot butter coming in hot butter okay no no we're gonna drizzle in we drizzle in the thing yes have you ever made this pie i i just did it like that in a thing no okay so what do we do we look like this i swear to god i've made this pie before and then it just incorporates itself this way and it gets all nice and evenly sandy oh i was just doing it by hand like in a bowl and then we can do like a quick scrape down oh yes you want to get in there guys so we got to get that stuff from the sides so the one another little pastry person trick is using a cup measuring spoon to sort of form the crust right that's like what people do yeah so that way you get like a nice evenly pat down layer the edges of the measuring cup sort of like fit right into the edge of the pie plate so you can get a nice compact even crust all around all right so we have a nice mostly neat crust get it even again i like to go up to the edge then you guys suggested you and solas test kitchen professionals lower temperature longer cooking time right instead of being at 350 for like 15 to 20 minutes we're going to 325 for 20 to 25 so it doesn't get too dark by the time it's nice and crisp so that's in there we are now going to make the custard which is super simple so we're going to use the yolks for the custard which is going to go on the stovetop and cook along with the pumpkin puree a couple of spices and the gelatin and then we're going to reserve the whites to separately whip those and then fold those in to the cooled custard okay and then along with the yolks we're gonna put those in the pot right yeah no no yolks and milk get whisked together oh yes and then you can do the dry mixture over there but we're just whisking the wet ingredients together so that they're incorporated and then these are going to get stirred into the gelatin mixture on the stove and cook so in the gelatin mixture all right so one packet of gelatin right about a scant three-quarter cup sugar and let me just say this doing a tasting in the bonapa test kitchen harder than i expected i'm really glad like you make a pie normally everyone's like oh my god thank you much for this pie it's so amazing here everyone's like how much sugar is in here like the twice is a little salty like zero did you incorporate this and you're like oh my god you people are so unappreciative recipes are great i know sugar i mean cinnamon nutmeg yup but it actually helped a lot so we reduced the over all amount of sugar a pinch of salt how much salt it's a half of half a teaspoon two pinches yeah done so let's go over here now and we're going to start cooking the custard all right so i'm putting this over medium medium-low heat adding the egg yolk and milk mixture to the sugar and spice um and you want to continue whisking so it doesn't curdle right yeah so constantly because otherwise you'll have scrambled eggs yeah we don't want scrambled eggs as much as we love scrambled eggs boss how does gelatin work well that's a really great question typically you would bloom the gelatin in water and we noticed that oh yeah your recipe doesn't call for that the egg whites are on coke so if you do not are not comfortable eating raw eggs the recipe is not for you but if you like caesar salad dressing or if you like a whiskey sour or you like homemade aioli then you're fine yeah yeah so but the egg egg yolks are cooked over heat the egg whites are just whipped without being cooked i don't have to worry about the frothiness do i doesn't really matter no that's just from whisking and that's going to dissipate oh that's looking pretty nice right yeah so it's like if you go like this that it leaves a trail behind which means it's thickened if it were completely liquid it would all just drip off so like that's a good test to do you think we're good yeah and then i'll open up the pumpkin or libby's tried and true i would say yeah for this just basic pumpkin puree you don't want like pumpkin pie mix you don't want the pre-sweetened or flavored and also you only want lippies yeah so then the pumpkin is going to bring the temperature of the custard down a bit but really as we learned it's important that it be cool what you don't want is to cool this completely to like chilled because there's gelatin in there now and if you were to just leave it in the refrigerator for an hour and a half and come back later to add your egg whites it would have set and then you'd have to disturb the set in order to incorporate the egg whites oh yeah and then i don't know what i'm going to do there's my right hand and left hand make sure you get all that out there okay let's check on the pie crust it's been about 20 minutes crust has browned as you can see around the perimeter um and it's dry and set so we'll let this cool now all right so while that's cooling we're going to whip the egg whites so i think that we have you whipping them to like medium peaks and then streaming in the sugar doesn't want to take over sure what's your technique um i do this oh that's how you won the competition yeah andy you want to take some notes do you want to observe and i did i did i did this okay so we're going to do a quarter cup sugar yeah scant little smidge lash or so so you want to stream you go and this kind of helps stabilize them and also sweeten them or correct so this will give them a little bit more structure and then also it'll make them taste like something all right so the original one look at that i might have forgotten to say stiff or soft so sola did soft peaks which ultimately proved to be didn't give enough lift to the final customer yeah so it was a little bit oh what no i'm sorry we're just talking we're just talking about the cross testing process and how important it is to a final recipe all right i'm gonna get the custard because you're almost done okay so we're gonna get this guy out so again you want it cool it doesn't need to be cold correct okay all right here we go so when you're like that you want a whisk or a full fold at this point all right so kind of going like that going around that's how you do it right you go around and then through i would do more like around and then fold and not like through the middle because what you don't want to do is just squash all of the air there okay all right so you incorporated you just spent like five minutes whipping those egg whites to stiff peaks and so you want to be really careful and gentle about the way you incorporate in the pumpkin custard because you don't want to collapse all of that air and that lift that you created because that's what's going to give the pie that fluffy texture so this is how i fold which is around the perimeter of the bowl and then you just sort of fold it in all right that's good all right so then we're just going to then pour it right in we have the crust it's cooled down and then just and it goes i'm worried i'm going to drop this on camera but nope i got it and then get all that out so then just sort of maybe do i need that i don't think i do i need the little spatula what do you want to do i was going to give you a spoon to just do what do you want all right what would you do go ahead if i was if i was looking for a little move movement i would maybe just do some like yes mellow swooshes okay now into the fridge so there you go gorgeous mussolin pie pumpkin chiffon pie into the fridge we stay overnight at least two hours should we go find our swap no because we got a whipped cream first oh god here it goes let's get andy involved oh should we write another column yes we can all compete this time we need bowls right and they all have to be the exact same size and we have to measure out the amount of cream to the vault to the top i would just like to say that i do something called an overhead press and i am lifting over 140 pounds above my head and neither of you do that and that's what i did this morning but go ahead okay i'm not getting this release ran eight miles this morning that is so different i don't care what does it have to do with your overhead presses because it that makes you big and stiff and you're you're like what did you say oh you're excusing yourself you're excusing yourself alone for fun yeah i'm just cooking back hold on a second what hold on there we go excuse me oh he's got an ice the frozen whisk all right let's go we didn't we on your mark get set up okay adam you've switched to like a more delicate back and forth now so many different molly but i'm mostly getting it all over the counter oh andy's doing really well and he's taking the lead one and a half minutes oh okay so i didn't know what to do with the whipped cream i was just gonna serve it at the table and then you were like no we're gonna do it up because this pie it's fine a little plain yeah yeah without it so we decided that we'll top the pie with the whipped cream but leave a little bit of the custard around the edge so you can see what's happening and then we can serve more alongside so this is like a really silly big spoon but just dolloping it nicely some more movement giving it some movement so much movement in this pie okay all right then the sieve this is like the fussiest thing ever for this pie oh see that's nice it's really nice it's like a little nutmeg on top of your eggnog or something it does kind of look like nutmeg oh in kind of a way that i don't like but in a pumpkin spice latte sort of way yeah excellent job molly thank you okay i think that's good these are nice slices you want that one you want to curve do you want a straight one i like that curvy one curve is pretty cool it's like some frank gehry building or something yeah are we tasting i mean it's so fluffy it's really right you expect it to be dense because it's like pumpkin pie pan that's honestly freaking delicious so good all right thanks guys we good i'm good all right we're good wow fine let's keep doing whipping cream let's also like slice onions and see like let's do that it's like a knife test i think i'm going to be fine i love her my little sister her older sister she's older than that i don't know why they they're still talking to me i don't know they keep me talking to me\n"