How to make perfect macarons? In theory I learned the most out of this video, endless amount of blogs and professional culinary books. The truth is, however that macarons are one of those desserts that need a lot of practise. There is so many things that can go wrong that even top pastry stars won’t get the same result every time.
I was too proud to admit their complexity scheduled a workshop to show off my macaron skills to my friends. Although I had the perfect recipe, experience, theoretical knowledge, the result was pretty sad. Out of 4 trays maybe 4 pieces weren’t cracked, burned, flat or crinkled. As you can see below, here is a sample from the same tray, same batch and how different result it brought.
Well, regardless of its looks, these babies taste always great. Toasted almond, raspberry and vanilla cream. Nom-nom!
Prep time: 30 mins
Cook time: 45 mins
Serves: cca 30 macarons
Ingredients
- 150 g almonds (or almond flour)
- 150 g icing sugar
- 150 g caster sugar + 35g
- 120 g egg whites (divided 60g and 60g) 50 g water
- Fresh raspberries
- Pastry cream
How to get there
- Process almonds with icing sugar until you get a fine powder. Sift into a bowl (you may need to process it multiple times to get all the lumps out) and mix 60g of the egg whites with it until you get a paste. Add pink food colouring until you get a bright pink. It’ll mellow out when you add the meringue. Set aside.
- Whip the remaining 60g egg whites with 35g of sugar until almost stiff peak stage. Meanwhile, heat 150g sugar with 50g water until 230F, then slowly stream the sugar syrup into the meringue with the beater running. Whip the meringue until stiff peak or until the meringue stays inside the beater when you pull it out.
- Add a part of the meringue into the almond paste and mix to loosen it up. Then incorporate the remaining meringue, folding until you get a lava-like texture that flows in thick ribbons that’ll sink back into the batter within 20-30 seconds.
- Transfer to a piping bag and pipe circles of the same size on baking sheet. Bump the sheet a 2-3 times on a table to get the bubbles out of the piped circles. Bake for 12-14 minutes – it’s ready when you touch the shells in the oven and they don’t wobble much).
- Cool for about 2 minutes, remove from the baking sheet and let cool completely before filling.
- Fill with raspberries and pastry cream.
Great source to demystify everything that can go wrong with macarons and loads of inspirational recipes were written by a very talented food blogger and photographer Tartlette.
Good luck!
