REAL PINEAPPLY MACARONS (GF)

Real Pineapply Macarons

DESPERATELY REAL STRAWBERRIES AND CREAM MACARONS (GF)

real strawberries and cream macarons

Okay, I'll come clean.

My eyes are drawn to the entertainment tabloids at the check-out counter and when a queue is particularly gruellingly long I have been known to pick one up and flip through its pages.

MACARONS MADE WITH PASTEURIZED EGG WHITES?

BABY BLUE  VANILLA BEAN MACARONS MADE WITH PASTEURIZED EGG WHITES

I threw caution to the wind today. 

Lately, I have been wondering if all the fussing with the whites is worth it: the separating, then the aging (I do my aging in the fridge) and the waiting until the whites are at room temp.

I purchased at Costco a 3-pack carton of “Simply Egg Whites”, intending to try them in a macaron recipe.  The only ingredient on the carton: egg whites.  There are no additives.  However, the whites are pasteurized.  Ordinarily, I make my macarons with aged egg whites from organic eggs.  I have a handy-dandy tried-and-true macaron recipe I go to that satisfies me immensely.  However, I wanted to try my hand at creating a new recipe using pasteurized whites.  This requires a good kitchen scale and so I advise you to weigh carefully if you intend to make macarons with my recipe.

Initially, I had the intention of making Blue, Green and White macarons in honour of the Canucks’ drive for the Stanley Cup (these colours are in their jersey).  I continue to turn that oven on every game and bake something just so that I don’t jinx it.    The other night it was pizza.   I’m getting tired of cookies.  A colleague waxed on about my macarons the other day and put the seed in my mind that I ought to make macarons again.  I haven’t made them since Christmas!

Unfortunately, mid-way through making these, I lost interest in decorating the macaron shells with the green macaron batter.  I wanted to go for a run on the treadmill so I ditched my ambitious decorating plans.  Going on the treadmill allowed me some caloric leeway I figured--to enable me to sample the macarons to my heart’s content. 

I had intended to pipe green batter onto the blue shells.  This didn’t work out and I ended up eating the partially decorated baked shells unfilled because they didn’t look anything  like the team colours anyway.  They were delicious, btw.

Fortunately, the blue macarons were quite pretty and though the green is missing, the major team colours are blue and white anyway. The green is just used as trim.  I think this will have to do. 

As you can see, using pasteurized egg whites worked.  Because I didn’t want to risk failure I did a few things to ensure my macarons had feet.  I added 1 teaspoon of meringue powder (dried egg white powder) and 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar to stabilize the whites while I was whisking them.  I whisked the whites a total of 10 minutes in my KitchenAid mixer.  I did not use room temperature whites.  I did not age the whites.  I did microwave them for 10 seconds in the microwave oven.  I touched the whites coming out of the microwave and they weren’t even room temperature.  I figured I’d use them anyway.  Guess what?  It's all okay!  The aging step was a bother, the separating of whole eggs was a waste of time and energy and now I know I don’t have to figure out what to do with all those egg yolks!  I know I can make pastry cream, custards and all sorts of things with yolks, folks.  However, I just want macarons!  I don’t have the time or inclination to make other stuff with the yolks.  This pasteurized egg whites idea is great for instant gratification!

So I dedicate my experimental recipe to the Canucks.  It’s a winner! I hope they are too!

CANUCKS MACARONS
300 g  confectioner’s sugar
225 g  finely ground almonds
150 g  pasteurized egg whites [I used “Simply Egg Whites”]
1/2 tsp  cream of tartar
1 tsp  meringue powder [I used Wilton brand]
150 g   granulated sugar
5 ml  vanilla paste
Teal or baby blue food colouring [I used Wilton food colouring paste]

1. Preheat oven to 310 F.
2. Put the icing sugar and ground almonds in a food processor.  Pulse until finely ground and combined well.
3. Sift the icing sugar and almond mixture into a bowl.  Discard large chunks of almond.
4. Microwave pasteurized egg whites and meringue powder for 10 seconds in a microwave safe measuring cup.
5. Using a mixer with a whisk attachment, whisk egg whites until foamy.  Add cream of tartar.  Gradually add sugar. Whites will become shiny.
6. Continue to whisk until stiff peaks form. [It took me 10 minutes.]
7. Manually fold almond and icing sugar mixture into egg whites.  Add food colouring.
8. The batter should flow “like magma”.  It should not be spongy and it should not hold a peak.   It should spread very slowly.  Fill a piping bag that has a large round tip with batter.
9. Pipe small rounds onto parchment-lined tray and let air dry for 10 minutes.
10. Bake 10-12 minutes or before the macaron shells start to turn brown.

CLASSIC VANILLA OR ALMOND SCENTED BUTTERCREAM FROSTING
6 oz (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
2 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon clear vanilla extract or 1 teaspoon clear almond extract

1. Place the softened butter in bowl of mixer.
2. Gradually add the sugar by sifting a small amount over the butter and stirring to incorporate. Continue until all the sugar is blended in.
3. Beat in the milk until smooth.
4. Beat in the electric mixer until the icing is pale and fluffy, about 5-7 minutes.
   

FESTIVE CHRISTMAS MACARONS

HO HO HO!  Pistachio macarons with Chestnut Cream, Vanilla Buttercream and Glace Cherry fillings.
VARIATION #1:  MATCHA-PAINTED PISTACHIO MACARONS WITH VANILLA BUTTERCREAM

Hand-painted pistachio macaron shells with buttercream filling.  The “paint” is matcha.

Follow the recipe for Pistachio macaron shells exactly.  I made two separate batches and just changed up the fillings to make my life a bit easier.
*Please hit the "read more" link to proceed to the recipes and techniques for the 3 macaron variations.

RAZZLE-DAZZLEBERRY MACARONS

razzle-dazzleberry macarons: who doesn't love a surprise?
Imagine my surprise when Stomach actually pronounced my latest batch of raspberry macarons amazing. This is saying a lot from a man who doesn't seem to eat anything sweet willingly.


I zinged up my trusty ol' basic macaron batter with a couple of tablespoons of finely ground dehydrated raspberries and dumped (way too much) powdered red food colouring into it as well. The red colour of the macaron shells was so intense. They even left a faint red stain on our tongues!

I piped a ring of Beranbaum's NeoClassic Buttercream (my desert/dessert island buttercream) along the macaron shell edge and then I piped a nice fat blob of seedless raspberry jam in the centre of the ring. After sandwiching two macaron shells to cover the filling, you couldn't tell that there was a secret explosion of raspberry filling inside. Bwah-ha-ha!
Check out my recipe below.

Razzle-Dazzleberry Macaronsadapted from tartelette
Makes 35

225 gr powdered sugar
125 gr ground almonds
3 egg whites (about 100gr)
25 gr granulated sugar
2 tablespoons finely ground dehydrated raspberries
powdered red food colouring

• In a food processor, run the nuts, dehydrated raspberries and powdered sugar until the nuts are finely ground. Run through a sieve if needed.
• Whip the egg whites until foamy, slowly add the granulated sugar, until they are glossy. Continue beating until stiff peaks are formed. Add the food colouring.
• Slowly fold the nut/sugar mixture into the whites with a wide spatula. The mixture should remain shiny and flow easily.
• Fill a pastry bag with the batter and pipe rounds onto parchment-lined baking sheets.
• Let the macarons rest for 20 minutes to develop a skin. Touch the tops to ensure that they are not tacky. If they are, leave them to rest longer. [it was humid that day and I made big macarons so I had to leave them for 1 1/2 hours!]
• Preheat the oven to 300 degrees fahrenheit and when they are ready, bake them for 14-16 minutes.
• Let cool, remove from the paper and fill with the vanilla buttercream and seedless raspberry jam. Procedure: fill piping bag with buttercream and pipe a ring around the inside edge of a macaron shell. Fill another piping bag with seedless raspberry jam and pipe a mound of jam in the centre of the ring. Sandwich another macaron shell on top.

Neoclassic Vanilla Buttercream
(from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Cake Bible )
6 large (3.5 fl oz/ 4 oz/112 g) egg yolks, room temperature
sugar (3/4 cup/5.25 oz/150 g)
corn syrup (1/2 liquid cup/5.75 oz/164 g)
unsalted butter (2 cups/1 lb/454 g) (must be softened)
vanilla (2 T)
optional: liqueur or eau-de-vie of your choice (2-4 T/1-2oz/28-56 g)

• Have ready a greased 1-cup heatproof glass measure near the range
• In a bowl beat the yolks with an electric mixer until light in colour. Meanwhile, combine the sugar and corn syrup in a small saucepan (preferably with a nonstick lining) and heat, stirring constantly, until the sugar dissolves and the syrup comes to a rolling boil. (The entire surface will be covered with large bubbles.) Immediately transfer the syrup to the glass measure to stop the cooking.
• If using an electric hand-held mixer, beat the syrup into the yolks in a steady stream. Don't allow syrup to fall on the beaters or they will spin it onto the sides of the bowl. If using a stand mixer, pour a small amount of syrup over the yolks with the mixer turned off. Immediately beat at high speed for 5 seconds. Stop the mixer and add a larger amount of syrup. Beat at high speed for 5 seconds. Continue with the remaining syrup. For the last addition, use a rubber scraper to remove the syrup clinging to the glass measure. Continue beating until completely cool.
• Gradually beat in the butter and any optional flavouring. Place in an airtight bowl. Bring to room temperature before using. Rebeat to restore texture.
  Store: 6 hours room temperature, 1 week refrigerated, 8 months frozen

GIRLIE OREO MACARONS

Oreo cookies buzzed up in a Blizzard from Dairy Queen are my idea of summer. There's nothing better than sittin' against a log on the beach watching the sun set into English Bay while slowly scraping the slender plastic red spoon across the craggy soft-serve vanilla ice cream studded with brown-black cookie chunks.

Summer is slowly slipping away and the evenings are chillier in Vancouver. Instead of the Blizzard, fall beckons me to create macarons!

Though you won't find pink anywhere in my wardrobe, for some reason I find it a very appealing colour contrast for anything chocolate. Pink and brown are fabulous together and in terms of baked goods, you've seen how well they go over in my Girlie Chocolate Buttermilk Cupcakes! Yummo!

I was aiming for the flavours of an oreo cookie but I wanted something more girlie and more delicate. I think Oreo cookies with a pink filling instead of white would be such a big seller! I know my kid would be dragging me down the local cookie aisle for them.

So, instead of the shortening-laden oreo-cookie filling, I grabbed a huge hunk of white chocolate from my wine fridge. By the way, did I tell you that along with my red wine, I've been storing chocolate in my wine fridge? I've been doing this for years. It's so working out for me! The chocolate never gets a bloom, and it never melts in the summer. My two favourite things in one special little temperature-controlled environment. Unorthodox, yes, but I love it.

The white chocolate buttercream...well, it was so delicious! I totally winged it and just chopped up about 6 oz of some Callebaut white chocolate, melted it and added it to my buttercream in the mixer. The texture of the filling turned out to be like that of oreo cookie filling and the flavour was definitively of white chocolate. And any buttercream tastes better when it's pink! To my trusty tried and true favourite basic macaron recipe, I added a couple of tablespoons of dark cocoa powder to the batter. My macaron shells were topped with organic crushed cocoa nibs. They were a lovely textural contrast and injected another dimension of cocoa flavour to the delicate French cookie. I loved how the pink white chocolate buttercream contrasted with the dark cocoa macaron shells. They were so edible.

There you have it: my Girlie Oreo Macarons

RASPBERRY MACARONS WITH WHITE CHOCOLATE

raspberry macarons with white chocolate

Had a hankering for pink macarons...and I had these dehydrated raspberries in my cupboard. What the heck I bought the dehydrated raspberries for initially, I don't remember. I grated the little raspberries over the freshly piped macarons before I let them rest the prerequisite 20 minutes. The raspberries started to crumble; so I put some in my Bullet and ground them to a powder and dusted them over the tops of the macarons.

dehydrated raspberries add an intense aroma and splash of colour to the shells

freshly baked raspberry macarons

The macarons out of the oven smelled of raspberries and looked cool. Being a lazy butt, and mind you, I am still preoccupied with dispensing eyedrops in my newly "Lasik-ed" eyes every hour--I decided that instead of a white chocolate ganache, I'd just melt the white chocolate and pipe it between the macarons. I figured it couldn't taste that bad, right? It's chocolate! I suppose I could have gotten fancy and put a blob of seedless raspberry jam in the center before piping a circle of white chocolate around it, but I didn't. Maybe next time.

raspberry macarons with white chocolate filling

here the macarons are being packaged for delivery by bebe to her preschool teacher!

CAKEBRAIN'S BLACK SESAME MACARONS

black sesame macarons with black sesame buttercream

Here's the recipe for the yummy Black Sesame Macarons I made a while back.

Cakebrain's Black Sesame MacaronsMakes 35
225 gr powdered sugar
100 grams ground almonds
25 grams ground black sesame
3 egg whites (about 100gr) at room temperature
25 gr granulated sugar

In a food processor, run the nuts, black sesame and powdered sugar until the mixture is finely ground. Run through a sieve if needed.

Whip the egg whites until foamy, slowly add the granulated sugar and continue whipping until they are glossy (stiff peaks).

Slowly fold the nut/sesame/sugar mixture into the whites with a wide spatula. The mixture should "flow like magma". When you form a peak, it should slowly dissolve back into itself and flatten.

Fill a pastry bag with the batter (I use a Wilton #12 tip) and pipe small rounds onto parchment lined baking sheets. I like to make small macarons about 3/4 inch to one inch in diameter. If you make your macarons too big (over an inch) they take longer to bake and may collapse if taken out too early.

Let the macarons rest for 20 minutes while you preheat the oven to 315degrees Fahrenheit.
Bake one tray on the middle rack for about 8 minutes. Look at the macarons. By this time, the feet should be forming. Whoopee! Once the feet have formed, lower the oven temperature to 300degrees F. Open and close the oven door slightly to allow a little of the heat and moisture to come out. Bake a further 4-6 minutes at the lower temperature.

Let cool, remove from the parchment paper and fill with buttercream or ganache.

BLACK SESAME MACARONS

black sesame macarons with black sesame buttercream filling

Now that my battle with the various macaron recipes is over, I can relax and enjoy experimenting with the different flavour combinations one can achieve with these little sandwich cookies. I've got the "macaron bug" and I'm trying different flavours with my trusty basic macaron recipe. I'm starting to get the feel of making these cookies and it's getting easier with every batch I make. This is heartening because initially, they can seem quite aggravating and temperamental if you do not have a solid recipe from which to work. macarons waiting for the oven to heat up

I purchased a sesame seed grinder at Daiso for $2 (what else? everything's $2!) and used it to grind the black sesame seeds. It was a cinch. The recipe went together smoothly and quickly and I didn't even have to wait hours for a skin to form. In fact, I threw caution to the wind and I put the macarons in with a tacky skin! Daredevil, eh?

macarons, straight from the oven

After dickering with a whole bunch of different techniques, I was able to finally arrive at a combination of techniques which allowed me to make macarons at ease and as quickly as possible. This was so great because I didn't have to "age" my egg whites, I used commercially ground almonds, I didn't use a sugar syrup, and I didn't wait for skins to form on the macarons. I'm now able to get macarons, with "feet", smooth tops with no cracks and a delicate shell exterior and tender and every-so-slightly chewy interior. They taste fantastic and I'm getting consistent results. I mean, why wait hours for egg whites to age? I used them at room temperature, but that's the only concession I made. I even cheated a bit by heating the whites over a bowl of warm water. The egg-whites couldn't tell that I didn't take them out hours ahead of time. Geesh!

the macarons created feet! (without even having to wait hours for a skin to form: bonus!)

I would say that the macarons, complete with the buttercream, were a tad too sweet for my liking. I generally don't like things as sweet as this. That being said, they were still addictive and I couldn't stop myself from wanting to pop more of them in my mouth. They kind of just melt in your mouth so quickly. Next time, I will doctor the buttercream by reducing the sugar. The shells themselves were not too sweet. They were just right.

My next experiment will be raspberry and white chocolate macarons

please see here for my recipe

CHOCOLATE MACARONS: A TRUCE

I call for a truce. Hey, I'm not waiving no white flag in this macaron war! To be honest, I'm not liking the eating part of the macaron battle. Initially, they're delicious...but after the third tray, I'm kind of sick of them. I love chocolate, but the chocolate macarons I made just don't ring my bell. I much prefer the pistachio macarons or even the matcha macarons I made previously in other battles.

I used the Chocolate Macaron recipe from Veronica's Test Kitchen. I thought everything looked a bit "runny" compared to the sugar syrup method I used in the matcha macarons previously and even runnier than the pistachio macaron recipe too. I had followed the recipe exactly and even left my egg whites to age as recommended. Despite the ominous texture of the batter, I just plugged along and piped the macarons and waited the allotted 2 to 4 hours...after which they still seemed too tacky. The weather wasn't even humid that day, so we couldn't blame the usual rainy Vancouver weather. The macarons did have a skin but I was skeptical that they would hold up in the oven.

After a few minutes of baking, I noticed the tops starting to crack open (the skin was indeed too thin) and this first batch failed to grow the frilly "feet" properly. It was late in the evening and I decided to give up for the night. I left the two remaining sheets of piped macarons on the kitchen counter uncovered and thought that I had nothing to lose if I just left them overnight and baked them the next morning. If they didn't have a thick skin by morning, then I'd be surprised!

The next morning, the macarons had dry skins that I could touch without any tackiness. They looked adequately strong and I popped them in the oven and voila! Smooth flat tops, frilly feet and slightly chewy interior. Perfect. It figures.

I still find leaving raw egg whites out kind of icky, regardless of what they say about the antibacterial quality of egg whites...but it worked. I guess for this recipe that's what you have to do. This is why I'm apt to go with the sugar syrup method or the pistachio macaron recipe. There isn't this huge amount of time you have to invest in making these suckers. When it comes to baking, I'm kind of a last minute kind of, spur-of-the-moment kind of gal.

My advice to anyone attempting macarons is this: there's only one thing you have to check before popping macarons in the oven and that is that their skins have to be thick and strong enough to withstand the heat. If you deem the skins too thin when you touch them, or if your first sheet of macarons didn't create feet, don't despair. You have a chance to salvage the other macarons. If the skins are too thin, the macaron batter will heat up, and bubble up through the top and crack the surface, resulting in a flat cookie without feet and instead with cracks on the top.

Some options to wasting hours of time waiting for macarons to dry:

1. (my preference--find a good recipe) Use a recipe that doesn't require one to wait around for hours before baking your macarons. That way you don't have to invest a huge amount of time waiting for them. I am loathe to leave egg whites out and even more adamant that one shouldn't have to waste hours of one's time waiting around for things to dry. In the case that you have a troublesome recipe, you can still make your macarons do what you want them to do. Take action by using your oven to dry the macarons (all the trays in the oven) with the oven door open. I usually heat up the oven a bit and then turn the oven off. You must leave the oven door open; not allowing moisture to be trapped inside. You don't want to bake them, you just want the tops to dry out. Then check the skins to ensure they are strong enough to bake.

2.Another option for some people is what I accidentally did which is make the macarons in the evening and let them sit out to dry on the counter overnight. Then bake them in the morning. When you do this intentionally it just seems smarter, doesn't it?

Macaron tips:

-bake them one sheet at a time

-watch the first sheet like a hawk so you can adjust things for your subsequent sheets

-stated oven temperatures are a guide. they're not set in stone. adjust the temperature (usually lowering it) to ensure that your macarons don't brown too quickly. in fact, they're not supposed to brown at all

-eat the failures (or give them away and call them "cookies") because they taste good too

Macarons aren't that tough to make after all. Just use your noodle.

MALGIERI & ZUCKERMAN MACARONS VS. TARTELETTE MACARONS

Sigh. Macarons.

I had the good fortune of having a trusty comrade fighting by my side in my macaron battle today. J brought along a macaron recipe from Nick Malgieri and another from Kate Zuckerman's The Sweet Life. She too had been testing out recipes in preparatory anticipation of our ensuing battle. At home, she noticed some inconsistencies from batch to batch: first batch, no feet; second batch nice feet! Knowing J, and her exacting ways, I trust that she followed the recipe exactly. I mean, she didn't even want to play around with the batter and add any flavourings! The Zuckerman recipe was promising and so we tried it in my kitchen today; trying to tweak it to work for us. The only problem was that it called for one to leave the piped macarons out from 1 to 2 hours to dry and allow a "skin" to form! She had abandoned the Malgieri recipe because they all turned out too cookie-like.

Here's how the Zuckerman recipe went:
J brought Kate Zuckerman's macaron recipe into the ring for battle...

zuckerman's sugar/ground almond mixture, after sifting

zuckerman indicates to whip eggwhites to the soft peak stage

here's J gently folding the whites into the ground almond mixture

our little zuckerman macaron soldiers lined up waiting for oven time

While we were waiting for the skin to form, I suggested we make another batch with an interesting Pistachio Macaron recipe I had noticed on Tartelette's blog. I turned on my computer, grabbed 3 eggs straight from the fridge and cheated time by warming them up in a bowl of hot water to bring them to room temperature.

Upon looking at the baking Zuckerman macarons (which by the way had already been sitting for 2 hours on the counter waiting for skins to form), J noticed they weren't producing feet and some of the cookies were cracking. They were looking like plain ol' ordinary cookies. After dickering with the temperature--an initial blast of heat and then lowering it; reducing the temperature to the same as the pistachio recipe's, etc., we still couldn't get them to behave properly. So disappointing! She whipped the trays out of the oven, exclaiming they were unworthy of further time in the oven and the ganache filling! She's pretty strict, eh? I'm glad she's on my side in this battle.

zuckerman macarons with no feet, no smooth tops and cracked surfaces. yummy though

Here's how Tartelette's Pistachio Macaron recipe fared:

After grinding whole almonds and pistachios with confectioner's sugar, I folded in the stiffly beaten egg whites. The mixture was way stiffer at this point than Zuckerman's recipe.

the pistachio macaron batter, ready for piping

tartelette's macaron soldiers, ready and waiting (for only 20 minutes! not 2 hours like kate's!)

1st batch of pistachio macarons rising to the occasion (creating feet) in my Wolf oven

and then collapsing after I brought them out! drat!

some of these collapsed macarons had hollow bottoms. odd.

At this point, I decided the oven must be too hot (it was set at 315degrees F throughout for 12-14 minutes) for the full amount of time that the macarons had to be in there to bake. For the next batch, I watched them "rise/create feet" first (at 315 degrees) and as soon as the feet were at their height, I then turned the oven down to 300degrees F to finish baking. The results were much better looking and they looked very promising indeed!

2nd tray of pistachio macarons using the reduction of heat method

we quickly whipped up a simple ganache to sandwich the macarons

So the Tartelette recipe looked good and smelled good. It had a smooth top, it had even, frilly feet and the exterior was thin and yielded to gentle pressure. It was very delicate and when you bit into it, it was mostly hollow; its texture was slightly chewy and the flavour was delicate pistachio with a hint of almond. The ganache filling, when piped too thickly, was too overpowering and you couldn't taste the pistachio...so I would say a buttercream would be a better match. We later opted to make the filling just a smear to hold the two cookies together, though the cookie looks prettier with a thicker amount sandwiched in between.

Having tasted professionally made macarons, I was still not wholly satisfied however. I'm a texture person. I hate nuts, raisins and anything seed-like or grainy in my baked goods. Yuck. Though these macarons didn't have chunks (we sifted well), I didn't really appreciate the fact that the ground nuts were not as fine as the failed batch I had made previously with almond paste or with the Matcha macaron batter using the sugar syrup based on Tartelette's recipe. I wanted the macaron to dissolve into nothingness, but instead I was left with a few grainy bits of the ground nuts rattling around in my mouth. Also, it did not have the slight crunch of the matcha macaron recipe; nor its stronger flavour profile. I felt the Matcha macarons were much closer in texture to the macarons I like.

With both these recipes, we started off with whole almonds and whole pistachios. I personally like the more consistent and finer texture achieved by starting with almond paste (ideally) and after that, commercially ground almonds. Whole almonds have so far to go before they're fine enough for me.

I declare the Tartelette Pistachio Macaron recipe the winner today and have to say that the foolproof method of using the sugar syrup is superior in texture.

My next batch will be CHOCOLATE MACARONS! I hear they're the toughest flavour to make...