French Macarons 🍓

Well hello Cutie Pies. Today i wanted to share with you these lovely french macarons.

I honestly had had horrible experiences with macarons before, i'd follow the recipe step by step but always end up with a big failure. But this time i followed this recipe and the result was perfect. Glossy shells, check! Baking time, check! Smooth base, check! Easy to lift from the pan, check!

Those of you who aren't french speakers, there goes the recipe:

•150g powdered sugar

•150g almond meal

•60g egg whites

For the italian meringue

•50g egg whites

•150g granulated sugar

•35g water

•a pinch of cream of tartar or some drops of lemon juice.

First thing you wanna do is combine your powdered sugar and almond meal in a food processor, mix those just enough for them to be combined, move them to a bowl and set them aside.

Tips: i find that almond meal can be a little bit expensive compared to whole almonds. So my tip is to grab whole almonds, wipe them and put them in the oven for about 5 minutes, you don't wanna burn them just to give them that crunch. And then you ground those into a fine powder. And if you wanna make chocolate macarons you wanna add no more than 50g of unsweetened cocoa powder.

Moving on. In a saucepan, combine the granulated sugar and the water and you wanna cook it until it reaches 117°C. Meanwhile in your stand mixer, combine the 50g of egg whites with your cream of tartar or lemon juice and you wanna start beating them when the syrup is about 110°C. Once the syrup has reached 117°C, pour it gently over the egg whites and beat it until you have stiff peaks. At this point if you wanna add color to your macaron shells, add it to the meringue.

Tip: If you want to add flavor to your macaron shells as well, you can actually add ground dried fruits to your meringue. It would work amazing with dried strawberries or raspberries.

Once the meringue is ready, take about 1 Tbsp of it and add it to the sugar/almond mixture along with the 60g of egg whites and mix to form a paste. Then you wanna add the rest of the meringue and gently fold them together, combining everything. You don't have to mix it for so long as the batter can become runny, you wanna have a glossy mixture and when you lift it with your spatula it should form a ribbon.

Preheat the oven at 140°C. Transfer your batter to a piping bag with a 8mm tip and start piping your shells on a pan covered with parchment paper. Try piping small circles and if your shells have a lifted tip, don't worry about that, by the time you've done the whole pan they should have a smooth glossy surface. Pop the pan into the oven and bake them for 16 minutes. When your shells are done baking, let them cool down and remove them from the pan.

You can use whatever filling for your macarons, Dulce de Leche, Strawberry Jam, buttercream, ganache, even Nutella if that suits your taste.

Bonne Appétit Lovelies ♡