This healthy vegan marshmallow fluff is going to rock your world…
Sweetener of choice
+
Water from a can of chickpeas
=
Homemade marshmallow fluff ????
Crazy, right?!
I can’t take credit for this brilliant “bean liquid egg whites” discovery.
The idea was sent to me in a facebook message earlier this year by a reader who discovered you could whip up the liquid from a can of garbanzo beans with sugar to form stiff peaks then pipe the mixture out and bake it into vegan meringues.
Since readers often write to tell me their own recipe ideas or experiments, I didn’t think too much about the message at first, especially since meringue and I have always been more of acquaintances than friends.
However, a few months later when I noticed some of my friends posting stunningly beautiful chickpea vegan meringues on instagram, suddenly I was intrigued.
Healthy Vegan Marshmallow Fluff
Then another reader left a comment on the blog asking if I’d tried bean meringue yet and mentioning that chickpea liquid–commonly referred to as aquafaba–has been used as an egg replacer since as early as in a 1968 cookbook (Ten Talents, by Rosalie and Frank J Hurd).
Wait… so it can be an egg replacer in other things besides meringue?!?
Like crepes?! Or baked goods??
So many ideas are swirling around in my head right now…
Christina’s message had mentioned whipping the liquid with fine sugar to form meringue, but I wanted to know if the aquafaba would also work with a liquid sweetener.
Only one way to find out! Seven minutes in, my pseudo meringue still looked like water, and I was almost ready to give up and throw the whole thing out.
But—magically at minute 9—it began to thicken… and thicken… and thicken even more!
Above – watch the video of how to make vegan marshmallow fluff
I had a baking sheet all ready to go for the meringues…
The only problem was that I just couldn’t seem to stop dipping my spoon into the airy cream.
It was just like marshmallow fluff!
Ideas for ways to use this healthy marshmallow fluff include:
Homemade s’mores, as frosting for cupcakes or my Vegan Chocolate Cake Recipe, in fluffernutter sandwiches… the possibilities go on and on!
Edit – There’s also now a version for Chocolate Marshmallow Fluff!
Vegan Marshmallow Fluff
Ingredients
- 1 can chickpeas or white beans (15oz)
- 1/3 cup sweetener of choice, such as agave, fine sugar, or xylitol for sugar-free
- optional pinch cream of tartar, for stabilization
Instructions
- Open the can of beans and drain just the watery part into a stand mixer or a large mixing bowl. (Save the actual beans for a different recipe. If you need inspiration, here are 50+ Healthy Uses For Canned Beans.) You should have about 1/2 cup chickpea liquid. Add all other ingredients, and beat with an electric mixer or in a stand mixer for 12-16 minutes. It will look thin for quite a while—and you’ll probably be cursing me—but don’t give up hope! Mine really began to thicken around minutes 10-11. Cover and refrigerate any leftovers. It separates overnight, but re-beating works perfectly. (I’ve not tried this recipe without beaters, but you are free to experiment. The sugar version can be baked into meringues; I haven’t tried baking the liquid-sweetener version.) I’ve tried this healthy marshmallow fluff with both regular and unsalted bean liquid and can’t taste a big difference, so use whatever you have on hand.View Nutrition Facts
Video
Notes
More Vegan Recipes:
Vegan Breakfast Recipes – 50 Vegan Recipes
And now I’m going to go work on some homemade Mallomars…
This is literally the craziest thing I’ve seen on your blog.
But I kind of love it.
Wow, vegan pavlova on my mind.
Will this frosting on cake disintegrate overnight as well even if left in fridge?
I would guess that yes, it would. Best to frost right before serving!
How long does it keep in the fridge?? I’m guessing from comment above it doesn’t? Thinking of using it on my vegan sweet potatoes (trying your recipe of course!) but wanted to make the fluff in advance. Thx!!
Probably it will! I made it and it was disintegrating into a watery texture by the late evening and I made it at 5 p.m. so no I don’t reccomend this for cake icing. I’m just wondering if cream of tartar wouldn’t keep it thickened. Try that and let us know. I wish I’d thought of then.
There have been so many marshmallow recipes being posted now. I’m glad I got to see your version Katie! Could this be made with xylitol or date sugar?
I’ve not tried it with either of these two sweeteners, but maybe either experiment or do a google search to see if someone has made vegan meringue with one of them and blogged about it. Be sure to report back if you experiment!
Kristy has a recipe with xylitol I made it last week. It worked great
Who is Kristy? May I have a link please?
keepinitkind.com is her site
Hi Dana,
I just googled it and am guessing Michelle is talking about the following recipe: http://keepinitkind.com/vegan-smores-waffles-with-sugar-free-marshmallow-fluff/
I’ve not tried it, but Kristy is very respected in the vegan blogworld, so you should be able to use the linked recipe with success. (Also, those waffles look amazing…)
sorry Katie I feel weird linking another author’s recipe on here. I love Kristy’s stuff (as well as yours) I have both of your cookbooks. But I did make her fluff as I was looking for not as much sugar. Your is the first I saw with liquid sweetener though.
Ooh! No worries at all! I’m glad you mentioned the recipe and that it works with xylitol. I often don’t know if a certain substitution will work and am always really grateful when readers chime in with their experiences 🙂
Have you tried using chickpea meringue in baking yet? I was curious if you’ve tried whipping it and using it to make angel food cake.
I’ve tried meringues ( french style not swiss style like this ) with xylitol ( normal egg whites ) and it’s taken ages to dry out. Like 2, 3 days ages. So I’m assuming this would too. Oh and they taste like mint chewing gum due to the cold taste you get w/ xylitol. Some like it others don’t. Haven’t tried it with date sugar though.
Please please do not use Xylitol for ANY reason ! It is deadly to dogs and since they love the taste…many have died from finding gum, candy, mints , cookies made with Xylitol !! Of course dogs will go into cupboards, purses , backpacks and totes…often containing such a sweetened goodie..and very little can kill them ! This is well documented and I’m asking that you not advise people to use this sweetened for any reason and please share. ! THanks so much !
This IS crazy…I need someone else to make this. Like now. I am at work and don’t have my stand mixer OR a can of chick peas with me. I am trying when I get home either way! I bet it would be a lovely if you added some fresh strawberry juice to it. Yummm
I’m totally thinking lemon flavored meringues!!! … But I wonder if you bake these on low the same way you cook egg white meringues? So curious to try this!!!!!!
That is what I did, and it worked! I just treated them as if they were egg meringues. But, as mentioned, I have not tried baking the liquid-sweetener version.
How long should the meringues last after baking?
Two questions: first, can this be made by soaking dried chickpeas (or white beans) overnight and using that water?? rather than from a can? and two, has anyone tried with coconut nectar as the sweetener?
I second the question about using liquid from homemade beans:)
Third the homemade bean liquid! And how long do you bake the meringues, and at what temperature?
I’ve only used canned, but be sure to report back if you try with homemade beans! Or you could try googling to see if anyone has used non-canned liquid.
For the meringues, I just baked them as if they were egg meringues (using instructions for a non-vegan recipe). I didn’t write down a recipe, but I’m sure there are other vegan bloggers who have posted recipes for how to make chickpea meringues. I’m always hesitant to give links to recipes I haven’t personally tried, but here’s one I found from a quick google search just now: http://thevegancookiefairy.com/2015/03/15/coconut-lemon-meringue-pies/
Please remember that this isn’t soaking water but water of beans that have been soaked overnight *and* cooked. I highly doubt soaking water will work. Some companies use a lot of salt in the cooking water and others use kombu. I don’t which ones work the best or if this even matters — you’ll simply need to experiment. (If the water with kombu works, this is the healthier option.)
If you do use canned beans, please remember to make sure that your beans are from a BPA-free canned. Unfortunately, it’s still the norm to use BPA-lined cans. A list of manufacturers that don’t use BPA-lined cans (current as of January) can be found at http://bit.ly/1E0o5Hn.
Good luck and please let us know what you discover!!
I actually did cook some soaked chickpeas two days ago and was curious whether the cooking water would work as the liquid from canned beans. I didn’t add anything to the cooking water and let them cook for about 1 hour. When I beat the liquid it became considerably thicker and whitish like in Katie’s pictures, but I think it was too diluted, so I should have used less liquid for cooking. But in general it was very promising, just didn’t go as thick as in the pictures (but I also didn’t add so much sweetener because I already felt that the liquid was pretty thin and not the way it looks from canned beans). So much from my side, I guess it’s well possible with normal cooking liquid. 🙂
Maybe the ability of the mixture to stiffen up comes from a component of the kombu similar to agar agar? I’m just guessing, but that would make a lot of sense.
Talbot, it looks like you can use beans cooked in either salt or kombu — both work equally well. It doesn’t look like it’s a component of the kombu causing the mixture to stiffen.
Yes, very important to NOT use the soaking liquid. For chickpeas, perhaps the worst effect would just be flatulence. But for some beans (like red kidney beans), you could get very ill. When cooking dry beans, always soak them, then always throw that water away, and always rinse the bejeebers out of the soaked beans before you cook them.
For the record, the water left over after cooking chickpeas does work. I’ve cooked chickpeas in my Instant Pot and used the liquid leftover (aquafaba) to make meringue cookies using Katie’s recipe with sugar, vanilla (plus almond extract). I piped the meringue into cookie shapes and baked them for 1.5 hours at 200 degrees (I think that was the temp – it might have been 175). I put chocolate chips in the centers of some (those were my favorite!) and sprinkled cinnamon on top of others. They turned out perfectly and lasted for nearly a week in a closed container.
Lots of different opinions here about how to soak and cook beans, how much water, salt, etc, I’m trying to decipher it all! Those of you who have made this recipe with home cooked beans, could you post a recipe of sorts for your quantities and procedures from how you soaked to the finished product? Thanks!!
I have used the aquafaba I get from cooking chickpeas.
Directions:
Rinse 1 cup dry chickpeas
Place in pot of cold water
Bring to boil. Cover. Let stand 2 hours
DRAIN the liquid
Add 3 cups of filtered water to pot
Bring to boil. Cover. Simmer 4+ hours
Drain the aquafaba
Hope this helps
If you Google, How to make Aquafaba, it tells you exactly how to boil down the bean liquid to make it. You just can’t use the liquid as is. It’s very easy.
Thank you for trying it with liquid sweetener! I am excited someone else tried it, because I don’t eat refined sugars and only kept seeing the chickpea meringue around the internet made with dry sugar.
I also wanted to thank you for mentioning how you came up with this recipe and not taking credit for the garbanzo bean liquid egg replacer idea. I have seen SO MANY other bloggers post about this idea and act like it was their own brilliance, and it’s maddening to me that they’d try to deceive their readers like that and take all the credit for an idea that’s already been around the internet.
So excited to start making vegan marshmallow fluff sandwiches now 🙂
By the way, I just bought your book and it’s expected to arrive today!
oh please please please make crepes next!
Hoorrraaayyy!!! This is just what I have been yearning and searching for!!! An easy egg- dairy- and nut/coconut-free marshmallow recipe (food allergies). Thank you so much!!! Now my daughter can have her first smore. Yay!
I looked through this list, and yours is the only one addressing s’mores. Did it work out well for you?
Thanks!
Oh my gosh!,, I just made this yesterday myself! I saw someone else’s recipe online and decided to try it…all I had to say was wow… It was so good, I couldn’t beleieve it.
I’m so glad that you said we could use white beans instead. I’ve seen chick pea meringue before, but always skipped it because I’m allergic to chick peas 🙁 But now I can try this! I always discarded the liquid because it has preservatives in it, so is this really healthy?
Anyway, love your recipes. You’re my go to person for vegan desserts.
I use organic canned beans. Try preservative-free Eden.
Thanks for the recommendation. I honestly didn’t realize there were preservative free canned goods. My store doesn’t carry that brand, so time to hit up the health food stores 🙂
Oh. My. God. (!!!) I have heard this was possible (also that you could make this by boiling sesame seeds and whipping up the resulting eh.. water/gooey thing) but I’ve never seen anyone actually make it! Looks like my next cooking project 🙂 Thank you so much for having the courage to try this out and show us it actually worked!
I’ve made the meringue and made the fluff with xylitol instead of sugar. its good. I love seeing all the things people have created already
Wow this is awesome! I cant wait to see what other recipes come from this idea.
Katie! Love that you posted this! I have been searching and searching to find the nutritional facts on the bean liquid (sometimes called aquafaba… there is a whole facebook page dedicated to “hits and misses” using it!) How did you find the nutritional info of the bean liquid? I am on a special diet where I have to log every carb/protein gram. I even called some companies that sell garbanzo beans and they couldn’t tell me the macros of just the liquid! Any help would be great!
Hi Debra,
Based on the fact that half a cup of cooked beans and half a cup of canned cooked beans are listed at the same calorie count, and then taking into account the number of servings in a can and the total calories, it looks as if the manufacturers are calculating the water as having a minimal impact on total calorie count. Remember that nutrition labels are an estimate, never an exact science. (Nutrition labels in grocery stores are legally allowed to be as high as 20% off.) I’m not a doctor, so I can’t advise and would recommend you ask your doctor if it’s okay to count this water as zero or if he or she has an alternative suggestion for you.
Thanks for your response! I think when added, the water wouldn’t add anything, it is the sugars/carbs that “leech” off the beans that could be the issue. It certainly isn’t just water that we drain. I’ve tried to find info re: drained vs undrained so I can do the math, but I haven’t had success. Eden said the nutritional info on the label is for beans AND liquid, not drained beans. But when I search beans “drained” the counts are the same. Ack! Guess I will have to skip this magical recipe until I can figure it out! Love your site and all your recipes!
I cook a lot of garbanzo beans and never buy the canned. Normally my hubby drinks the liquid but have just told him that he does not get the next batch (today). My question is did you try it with cooked beans Katie? Is there any variation to your recipe. I am so excited to try this not to bake meringue but to frost or top desserts with, as you said… OH the possibilities, so exciting. And as an egg replacer? WHAT!!! YAY!!
I’ve only tried it with canned, but please be sure to report back if you experiment!
I used maple syrup and will try to make them into cookies at a low temp when I have time will let you know