Macaron Mayhem

This week, I attempted to make macarons. Here are the good ones!

My first attempt was chocolate macarons and to say they did not work out is an understatement! They turned out flat and were more like cookies. My family found it most amusing, which made me all the more determined to get it right. The second time around, using a different recipe, was much more successful. The macarons had a foot (the crackle on the bottom of each half), they were chewy in texture and were all roughly the same size. I used a recipe I found on youtube and adapted it slightly.

Macaron Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 cup icing sugar

• 3/4 cup ground almonds

• 2 egg whites (room temp)

• 1/4 cup caster sugar

• food colouring (needs to be in gel form)

Method

Preheat the oven to 150 C and put the icing sugar and ground almonds in a food processor. Grind these two ingredients together until a soft powder forms. Then take this powder and sift it and discard any big lumps.

Whisk the egg whites together until foamy (with a stand or hand mixer) and then add in the caster sugar. Beat the egg whites and sugar together until soft peaks form and at this point add in the food colouring. Make it two shades darker than desired because cooking the macarons will dull down the colour.

Whisk again until stiff peaks form. Make sure the sugar has been incorporated by rubbing a bit of the mixture between your thumb and index finger. If it does not feel grainy, then it is the right consistency.

Add in the ground almonds and icing sugar powder in two batches, folding gently to incorporate the powder with the egg mixture. This will make sure that the air does not all get knocked out. The consistency of the macarons is right when the mixture drops off the spoon slowly.

Transfer the mixture into a piping bag and pipe out little circles of macarons. Here is a template you can use in order to achieve uniform macarons: http://barbarabakes.com/wp-ontent/upLoads/2010/12/macarontemplate.pdf

Next, pop the air bubbles in the macarons by banging the tray on a solid surface. Do this four or five times.Then leave the macarons to rest for 30 minutes to 1 hour or until a skin forms. A skin has formed when you can touch the macaron and do not not get wet mixture on your finger. Bake in the bottom 1/3 of the oven (one tray at a time) for 15-18 minutes, rotating the tray halfway through (to ensure an even bake). Once they come out, leave them to cool completely before removing with an offset spatula. Fill with the filling of your choice, I filled some of mine with chocolate ganache and the rest with smooth raspberry and strawberry jam. Store in an airtight container and enjoy! Check out my other post on macarons!