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The dessert is believed to have been created in honour of the dancer either during or after one of her tours to Australia and New Zealand in the 1920s. The nationality of its creator has been a source of argument between the two nations for many years. The dessert is a popular dish and an important part norwegian wedding cake the national cuisine of both Australia and New Zealand.

With its simple recipe, it is frequently served during celebratory and holiday meals. It is most identified with and consumed most frequently in the summer time, including at Christmas time. The early history of pavlova can be traced to Australia, where recipes for a very similar dish have been found dating back to 1906, though this dish was only called a ‘cream cake’ and did not yet bear the name ‘pavlova’. A recipe for “Strawberries Pavlova” appeared in the New Zealand Herald on 11 November 1911, but this was a kind of ice block or sorbet. A 1922 book Australian home cookery by Emily Futter contained a recipe for “Meringue with Fruit Filling”. This is the first known recipe for a food entirely resembling the modern pavlova, though not yet known by that name.

The first known recipe for a dish bearing the name ‘Pavlova’ is from Australia in 1926 published by the Davis Gelatine company in Sydney. However, it was a multi-layered jelly, and not the meringue, cream and fruit dessert known today. Helen Leach, in her role as a culinary anthropologist at the University of Otago, states that the first recipe from New Zealand was a recipe for ‘pavlova cake’ in 1929. It has also been claimed that Bert Sachse created the dish at the Esplanade Hotel in Perth, Western Australia in 1935. Other researchers have said that the origins of pavlova lie outside both Australia and New Zealand. Research conducted by New Zealander Andrew Paul Wood and Australian Annabelle Utrecht found that the origins of the modern pavlova can be traced back to the Austro-Hungarian Spanische windtorte. An article in Melbourne’s The Argus from 17 November 1928 claims an “American ice-cream” was named after Anna Pavlova: “Dame Nellie Melba, of course, has found fame apart from her art in the famous sweet composed of peaches and cream, while Mme.

Michael Symons, an Australian then researching in New Zealand, has declared that pavlova has no singular birthplace. Rather, published recipes reveal the complex process of “social invention” with practical experience circulating, under a variety of names, across both countries. For example, Australians beat New Zealanders to create an accepted pavlova recipe as the ‘Meringue Cake’. Matthew Evans, a restaurant critic for The Sydney Morning Herald, said that it was unlikely that a definitive answer about the dessert’s origins would ever be found. People have been doing meringue with cream for a long time, I don’t think Australia or New Zealand were the first to think of doing that. Pavlova is made in a similar way to meringue.

A store-bought New Zealand pavlova decorated with wine gums, strawberries and cream. The soft marshmallow-like centre is visible. Pavlova has a crisp and crunchy outer shell, and a soft, moist marshmallow-like centre, in contrast to meringue which is usually solid throughout. It has been suggested the addition of cornflour is responsible for the marshmallow centre, although it has been debated that the cornflour is just another egg white stabiliser in addition to the acid. Pavlova is traditionally decorated with a topping of whipped cream and fresh soft fruit such as kiwifruit, passionfruit, and strawberries. Leftover decorated pavlova can be refrigerated overnight, but the dessert will absorb moisture and lose its crispness. Undecorated pavlova can be left overnight in the oven, or for several days in an airtight container, to be decorated when ready.