Reporting back with another vegan meringue development: you can make vegan Lucky Charms out of a can of freakin' chickpeas and it's blowing my mind.
When I made Lemon Meringue Pie and a test batch of meringue cookies over the weekend, my first thought was, "oh shit, this tastes like Lucky Charms marshmallows!" I waited about a day before trying it out. Set aside an afternoon for this recipe because we are making hundreds of little hearts, stars, horseshoes, clovers, blue moons, pots of gold, rainbows, and red balloons by hand.
Lucky Charms marshmallows color reference
You should have red, yellow, blue, purple, and green meringue to make the following marshmallows:
1. Hearts (red)
2. Red balloons (red)
3. Red rainbow stripe (red)
4. Stars (yellow)
5. Pots of gold (yellow)
6. Yellow rainbow stripe (yellow)
7. Blue moons (blue)
8. Blue rainbow stripe (blue)
9. Horseshoes (purple)
10. Clovers (green)
📖 Recipe
Vegan Lucky Charms
Make your own homemade vegan Lucky Charms cereal using aquafaba marshmallows!
Ingredients
- 1 vegan "Cheerios", or other cereal
- ⅓ cup aquafaba, (liquid from can of chickpeas)
- ⅛ teaspoon cream of tartar
- ½ cup sugar
- ⅛ teaspoon agar powder
- ¾ teaspoon vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
- Red, blue, and yellow food coloring
Instructions
- Combine the chickpea liquid and cream of tartar in a stand mixer equipped with a balloon whisk attachment and whip until it starts to thicken.
- Mix together the sugar and agar powder.
- Gradually add the sugar/agar mixture and the vanilla, and continue whipping until thick, about 8 minutes.
- Line 3-4 cookie sheets with parchment paper.
- Grab 3 small bowls and spoons and divide up the meringue mixture into the bowls. Using food coloring, make red, blue, and yellow meringue.
- Grab 2 more small bowls, then using some of the red and blue meringue, mix some purple meringue. Then using blue and yellow, make some green.
- Preheat oven to 200°F.
- Fill 5 small piping bags or ziptop bags (cut off the tip) with each color of meringue.
- Using Lucky Charms for reference, pipe your tiny marshmallows onto the prepared cookie sheet.
- How many marshmallows does this make? A lot. Depending on the size of your marshmallows and the spacing between them, you might fill up 2-4 full cookie sheets.
- Bake/dehydrate the marshmallows for 1-2 hours depending on the size.
- Turn off the oven and leave the marshmallows in the oven until they return to room temperature.
- Finally, mix with cereal, and eat with your non-dairy milk of choice!
Notes
- You can make your marshmallows in any shape.
- Try the Halloween Lucky Charms version of this recipe!
Nutrition Information:
Yield: 4 Serving Size: 1 bowlAmount Per Serving: Calories: 172Total Fat: 1gSaturated Fat: 0gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 1gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 70mgCarbohydrates: 40gFiber: 2gSugar: 29gProtein: 2g
All nutritional information presented within this site are intended for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and any nutritional information on seitanbeatsyourmeat.com should only be used as a general guideline. This information is provided as a courtesy and there is no guarantee that the information will be completely accurate. Even though I try to provide accurate nutritional information to the best of my ability, these figures should still be considered estimates.
Making Meringue
If you're new to making vegan meringue, here's a video that shows how the bean liquid will whip up:
The verdict?
I ended up using whole oat-y cereal, so the feedback I got was, "this tastes like childhood, but with fiber!"
These marshmallows are lighter and more airy than original Lucky Charms marshmallows, but they hold up just fine in a bowl of cereal and milk. Feel free to play around with the recipe, then report back if you can make the marshmallows any denser. Maybe a mixture of that technique plus more agar powder or a different kind of gum would alter the results.
I accidentally made my rainbow colors in the wrong order because Lucky Charms doesn't understand how rainbows work and uses blue on the outer stripe.
If you want to go into even more detail, you can mix orange and a darker green to add detail to the pots of gold and make clover hats. But let's get real: we're making these marshmallows by hand without the help of a cereal factory, so it's okay if your clovers are all one color.
I would tell you that they're magically delicious, but I don't want a cease and desist letter from General Mills.
Finally, go make some vegan Lucky Charms!
I did not invent the chickpea meringue, or Lucky Charms (duh.) Thank you to Goose Wohlt and Révolution végétale for the inspiration!
Becky
This is amazzziinng!
JB
I want these. *goggle eyes*
Brian D
I must have these!
June Burns
Awesome! I am going to try this soon. Vegan meringue marshies + cheerios = balanced breakfast, right? Haha. 🙂
veganchai
holy shit, kelly. that's all i've got for you: holy shit.
Jojo
This is too adorable! Love <3
Kip Dorrell
I'm so excited to try this! I have memories of sneaking handfuls of marshmallows out of the box as a kid and then getting told off when the box was nothing but boring flavourless cereal.
Richa
wow wow!
Manmita
I want to try the recipe, may I know if you have used powder / gel colors because members from the facebook meringue group have mentioned that sometimes meringue tends to deflate upon adding colors.
seitanbeatsyourmeat
I used Wilton gel colors, but had no problems with the meringue deflating. I did have trouble with yellow food coloring when making macarons, but regular meringues have held up well!
Natalie
Ahhhh!!!!!!! These. Are. SO CUTE!!!!
Laura Zalesak
What temp do you dehydrate at for how long (still an hour)?
Kelly Peloza
You mean using a dehydrator instead of an oven? Since the temperature of a dehydrator is lower than 200°F, they would probably take longer than an hour.
Gloria
Is there any replacer for agar? My husband is allergic 🙁
Kelly Peloza
The agar is meant to behave like gelatin, so my best guess would be guar or xanthan gum.
Kimberly
Please add me to your email list. (Website button is not working.) Thank you.
Kelly Peloza
Thanks for bringing that to my attention! I checked it out and it looks like when you click "Subscribe", the text field appears at the top left of your browser. You can type it in from there.
That's not supposed to happen, so I'm going to look into fixing it. Thank you!
Kelly Peloza
Hi Kimberly,
New update: I changed up the layout and the subscribe feature is now working correctly, so you can use it to sign up. I would be able to do it, but I don't know your email address. 🙂
-Kelly
Lacey Siomos
Hi Kelly,
I made these and shared the recipe in a few Facebook groups I'm in, we loved them!
Thanks for sharing this fun recipe!
Lacey
Kelly Peloza
Thanks, Lacey! I saw your post in the Vegan Meringue group and they look great. 🙂
Lacey Siomos
Do you mind if I share the recipe on my blog, with credit given to you?
Kelly Peloza
Just a link to the original post would be great!
Lacey Siomos
Absolutely!! 🙂
Thanks again!
Katie
Is cream of tartar crucial to the recipe?!
Kelly Peloza
Yes, an acid is important to set the meringue. You could also use lemon juice or something else acidic.
peanutbutterandellie
WOAH. WOAHHHH. WOAHHHHHHHHHHHH… This is amazing.
I have only good things to say about these delicious-looking and wayyyy healthier than the original Lucky Charms! Great job!!!
https://peanutbutterandle.wordpress.com
Amanda
Maybe you won't get the right shapes but how about a play doh extruder? Lol
Corinna
What kind of agar powder do you use?
Kelly Peloza
I think there's only one kind? Any agar powder will work fine.
Sam
...I love you. @_@
seitanbeatsyourmeat
???!
Marina
How long do they take to become not edible
Kelly Peloza
Hi Marina!
These are basically small meringue cookies that are completely dehydrated in the cooking process, so they should be fine for a few weeks. They haven't lasted that long around here, but I'd imagine they would get sticky from the sugar before actually going bad. Hope that helps!
-Kelly
Diane
I made these delicious bite size pieces of paradise! So good. Super easy. The hard part was waiting for them to be done in the oven. It was perfect and I appreciate you sharing the recipe! Will make again....and again.
Wrenboldlygoes
This is so exciting Kelly !!! How long do you think these would keep ? I’d love to do jars as gifts for family !
Claire
Hello, do these hold their shape when in the milk, like lucky charms marshmallows? Or do they dissolve?
seitanbeatsyourmeat
Hi Claire! The marshmallows will hold their shape in the milk. Of course everything will get soggy after a while, but the marshmallows will not completely dissolve while you’re eating the cereal.
Kellie
How much liquid sweetener would I use or would it stay 1/2 C either way? TIA!
Kelly Peloza
Hi Kellie!
I wouldn't recommend using a liquid sweetener for this recipe. The sugar is important to create the meringue structure and adding extra moisture may affect the process. If you wanted to experiment though, I'd start with 1/3 cup liquid sweetener, but I have not tried this and can't guarantee it will work.
Hope this helps!
Kelly