French Macarons
One of the only recipes that’s ever intimidated me, French Macarons seemed to be a confection made only by trained pastry chefs. I stepped out of my comfort zone, and, whew, I’m sure happy I did because these little French cookies are sensational.
The two most important tips I have to offer are to invest in a kitchen scale and quality parchment paper (not wax paper).
Elements
200 g Egg whites, room temperature
280 g Almond Flour
180 g Granulated Sugar
260 g Powdered Sugar
10 ml Madagascar Bourbon or Mexican Vanilla Extract
1,600 mg Cream of Tartar
Directions
Place a sifter into a medium mixing bowl and almond flour and powdered sugar; whisk into bowl and discard any lumps.
Add dry mixture to a food processor fitted with a blade and blend for 1-2 minutes.
Spoon mixture back into sifter and sift again discarding larger bits.
Process the mixture a second time in the food processor. At this point, you should have a very fine, sand-like consistency; set mixture aside.
Add egg whites and cream of tartar to the mixing bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment.
Whisk on medium speed until eggs become foamy; 30-60 seconds or so.
With the mixer whisking, slowly begin to sprinkle granulated sugar into the eggs until all is added; turn speed to high and keep whisking.
Keep whisking.
Add desired food coloring; I used beet juice to achieve pink.
Whisk until very stiff peaks stay on the tip of the whisk.
Add 1/3 of the almond flour mixture to egg whites and fold in by hand with a spatula; scrape the sides of the bowl, cut through the center of the batter with the spatula, gently press batter into the side of the bowl, repeat.
Once incorporated, add another 1/3 of the dry mixture and fold.
Repeat step 11 with the final 1/3 of the dry mixture.
Fold batter until it ribbons off of the spatula to and you can draw a figure 8 without drips.
Add batter to piping bags and pipe onto parchment-lined baking sheets; not silpat mats. I made the mistake of using silpat mats and the cookies were far too sticky, even baked, to remove from the mats. Do not use wax paper.
important! Slam each cookie sheet 10-20 times to remove air bubbles. If you don’t do this, your cookies may bake with a hollow center from air expansion. It’s loud but a great stress reliever. ;-)
Once piped, set aside for one hour to set. You should be able to touch the cookies lightly and feel the ‘skin’ of the cookie is set.
Bake for 10-12 minutes. You’ll see the ‘crinkle feet’ form about halfway through baking.
Remove from oven, cool for 10 minutes, place on cooling rack.
As remaining cookies are baking/cooling, make your desired filling. I prefer AMERICAN BUTTERCREAM FROSTING or ALMOND BUTTERCREAM FROSTING, but many use jam, French buttercream, or whipped cream.
Pipe filling onto the bottom of one cookie and place a second cookie over it to form a sandwich. Place filled cookies into the refrigerator, covered, and serve as desired!