Strawberry Basket Pavlova
After four dramatic attempts, I can proudly say: "Pavlova Architect" is officially on my resume. This Strawberry Basket Pavlova might look dainty, but behind that delicate meringue weave is a saga of egg white disasters, stuck meringue mishaps, and structural strawberry overloads.
Attempt 1: Egg whites refused to whip (bad egg whites are apparently a thing)
Attempt 2: I piped the basket directly onto a baking sheet—without parchment. Regret.
Attempt 3: Overfilled with strawberries. Cracked under pressure (literally).
Attempt 4: Success! Crisp meringue exterior, soft marshmallowy center, and a strawberry-filled core—all held together with a sturdy basket weave.
Keep reading to see photos of my failed attempt plus all the tips and tricks I used to finally bring this strawberry pavlova masterpiece to life.
Recipes
Techniques
This pavlova has 2 parts:
Outside basket weave - Baking Pan 1
Interior pavlova - Baking Pan 2
Using two 6” pans you’ll grease the outside of Baking Pan 1 with butter and line the outside with parchment paper. Then with Baking Pan 2, you’ll grease and line the inside with parchment paper (including the bottom).
Prepare the meringue as per the above recipe and you can dye it brown if you’d like.
Pro tip for dying meringue - instead of dropping food colouring or gel directly into the meringue, take a small scoop of the meringue out of the mixing bowl and mix in the food colouring and then return the dyed mixture back in with the rest of the meringue. This will help the colour come out more saturated and even.
Start preheating oven.
Then using a basket weave piping tip (this is a tip where it’s serrated on 1 side and flat on the other - here’s an example), you’ll pipe along the outside of Baking Pan 1.
Here’s a YouTube tutorial for this technique: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGMrI3wIPdY&t=1s&ab_channel=Wilton
Once it’s piped all the way around, set this aside on top of a large baking sheet.
Then take the remaining meringue you have and scoop it into Baking Pan 2. My recommendation is to smooth it out so the walls are taller around the outside and there’s a dent in the center. The reason for this is so when you put strawberries in they naturally cluster in the center instead of pushing against the basket walls.
Put Baking Pan 2 on the same baking sheet and then put the baking sheet in the oven and follow recipe instructions. I left the meringue to cool overnight to avoid cracking from sudden temperature changes.
To assemble, very carefully take the pavlova out of Baking Pan 2 and place on your cake stand/plate. Then carefully using the parchment paper, slide the basket walls off Baking Pan 1 and carefully place around the pavlova center. Then fill inside with strawberries or any other fruit. You can also fill it with whipped cream and any other classic pavlova toppings.
Dig in and enjoy!
Failed Attempts (and what I learned)
With this attempt, I piped the meringue directly onto an ungreased and unlined baking pan. 2 lessons here:
Meringue is sticky and also shrinks as it bakes so you need to have parchment paper between the meringue and the pan if you want to be able to remove it.
For a dessert where you’ll only really see the walls, it’s a waste of time piping the bottom of the basket (and it also makes it impossible to remove from the pan).
And with this next attempt, I made it all the way to the end with a fully standing basket but the interior pavlova was made in a cone shape (think traffic cone). This caused the strawberries to roll onto the outside and push against the walls of the pavlova causing the basket walls to crack.
I learned from this attempt that I needed to make a ‘well’ with the interior pavlova so that the strawberries roll towards the center instead.