Taiwanese Pineapple Tarts

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR !

And in the spirit of all things red and prosperous, I bring you:

Heart shaped pineapple tarts.

Why hearts ?

There are two kinds of pineapple tarts. One is the traditional type of pineapple tarts, like these or these. They're a little smaller and the pastry can be a little savory because I've seen people put cheese in it. While I love cheese, I don't really want it in my pineapple tarts.

Another one is the Taiwanese style of pineapple tarts. These are square and larger than the traditional ones and the jam is totally encased in pastry. And the pastry in case is always sweet. And it's a shade crumblier(if that's even a word) than the traditional Chinese ones. They're baked in square molds to get that square shape and since I couldn't find square molds or cookie cutters, I had to make do with hearts.

I have loved Taiwanese pineapple tarts for as long as I can remember. And I don't even remember the first time I tried them - I think it was when a friend of my moms gave a box of them to us as a gift. I'm not even sure if they have these in Taiwan.. And my mom rarely (read - doesn't) buy them, so the only option I had was to make them myself. So I did. And after four or five unsatisfactory attempts (I didn't use cookie cutters or molds prior to this so they sorta spread out but were still tasty), I finally got a batch that I'm pleased with. These are cute and when they bake, exude a sweet, milky smell that makes me think of caramels and milk and milk caramels. 

As I type this, I'm sitting on the floor playing cards with my cousins. I haven't done this in a while, and it's safe to say I've missed it. The number of people going back to my grampa's place are slowly dwindling as the number of cousins getting married are increasing. The number of mosquitoes remain the same and I think the amount of sugar I consume makes my blood seem like an attractive snack for the little insects *scratch*.

Pastry recipe taken from here. I did substitute part of the flour with cornstarch and I really recommend you do the same because it gives the pastry a melting quality that I love love love. I also used heart shaped cookie cutters because one: I thought they were cute and two: I couldn't find square ones, for some reason. So it became a CNY treat with a Valentine-ish theme.

As for the pineapple paste, I followed this recipe:

860g ripe pineapple, peeled and cored

135g caster sugar (more to taste)

1. Chop the pineapple into cubes and put them in a food processor. Blend until very finely chopped or smooth - I went for smooth. Pour into a wok.

2. Cook over medium to medium-high heat, stirring, until the juices have evaporated and the mixture is dry. This could take around half an hour.
3. Add half of the sugar and stir until dissolved. The mixture will release some more juice at this point, so cook until the juices have evaporated. Stir in the remaining sugar until dissolved. Taste the jam (be careful, it's hot) and add a sugar one tablespoon at a time, if you think it's too sour. How sweet it is will depend on the pineapple you have. 

4. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring, until the jam is very thick and forms a ball of sorts. It won't be like the jam you see in jars, it'll look almost like a stiff dough. This will take at least forty five more minutes of cooking, and could take up to two hours. I usually cook it for an hour before taking it off the heat. Leave the jam to cool completely before rolling into balls and filling the tarts.

Checkerboard Cookies

It is midnight again and here I am still up and eating a banana as I type this. Yes, a banana. Some people eat chocolate cake when they can't sleep, or curry or leftovers (ahemNigellaahem - but she looks so good doing it) but I eat bananas. Don't judge.

I've been a little knackered due to the baking of cookies these days so I took a nice long nap in the afternoon today.. And now I'm wide awake. Damn. I'm not one for power naps too, where you just sleep for ten minutes and wake up bright and chipper. I nap for ten minutes and I wake up looking and sounding like the Grinch. Not a pretty sight.

And then tomorrow - wait, it's techically today since it's Wednesday already - we'll be heading back to my gramma's house, also known as my parents' childhood home 500 kilometers away from here. It's a minimum of four hours in the car if the traffic is smooth, eight if it's horrible. Trust me, eight hours in the car isn't fun. Even after two, my legs are twitching and my bum hurts. 

But I want to go back. I haven't been back in a year. It's very quiet there, being a sort of countryside and all. There aren't many cars on the road, the air is clean and fresh smelling and then occasionally the random chicken wanders into the house. While I couldn't live there, it's a nice getaway. Plus, my cousin is getting married ! It's two wonderful things in one - a family reunion and a wedding. Eeep I'm so excited now...

Anyway, these checkerboard cookies came about when I was flicking through some cookbooks the other day and decided that I was tired of making macarons and butter cookies and for some reason, it seemed like a brilliant idea to be making and cutting and stacking layers of dough. So I made the cookies once, for my aunt, then had to make them another time for my gramma. I love these cookies (who wouldn't ? They look so pretty and smell so good when they're nice and warm) but I'm all checkered out. So I strongly advise you to make them once and make lots. Double the batch if you want to. Just make loads and eke them out. You won't regret it.

Note: the ends of the log come out kind of nubbly and wonky looking. But they get prettier when you get to the centre. No big deal, just dispose of the ugly ends - I don't think you need me to tell you how :)

Checkerboard Cookies

For the vanilla dough:

120g all purpose flour

20g almond flour/meal

60g icing sugar

1/4 tsp salt

20g egg (beat in a bowl then measure out the amount needed)

70g unsalted butter, room temperature

1 tsp vanilla extract

For the chocolate dough:

105g all purpose flour

15g cocoa powder

20g almond flour/meal

60g icing sugar

1/4 tsp salt

20g egg

70g unsalted butter

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 egg white, beaten until foamy

1. Make the vanilla dough: beat the butter and icing sugar until fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla, beat until combined. Sift in the flour, almond meal and salt, beat until the mixture forms a soft dough. Don't overbeat.

2. Gather the dough into a ball and press into a flat disc. Wrap with clingfilm and chill for half an hour.

3. Make the chocolate dough: beat the butter and icing sugar until fluffy, then add the egg and vanilla and beat until well combined. Sift in the flour, cocoa powder, almond meal and salt and beat until the mixture forms a soft dough. Don't overbeat.

4. Gather the dough into a ball and press into a flat disc. Wrap with clingfilm and chill for half an hour.

To assemble: Take out both the chocolate and vanilla dough. Roll them separately into squares about half an inch thick. 

Using a pastry brush, brush a little beaten egg white on the chocolate dough. 

Stack the vanilla dough on top of the chocolate dough, making sure the edges are aligned for a prettier finish.

Cut the stacked dough in half lengthways. 

And brush some beaten egg white over one of the halves.

Stack the unbrushed half over the brushed half so you get four layers of dough, like this.

Trim the raggedy edges with a sharp knife. Cut the dough lengthways into four equally wide strips. Use a ruler if you want.

Now take one of the strips and brush the cut side with egg white. Take another strip and turn in upside down, then stick it to the first strip so the vanilla dough is aligned with the chocolate dough. Brush the cute side with more egg white, then stick on a third piece of dough so the colors are alternating. Brush again with more white and stick on the last piece of dough. You should have a block of dough with strips of vanilla, chocolate, vanilla, and chocolate. Something like this.

Whatever trimmings you have, you can smooth into a log to make marble cookies later.

Wrap the checkered log and the marbled log tightly with cling film. Press the checkered one into a square. Chill both the logs in the freezer until solid.

All you have to do next is preheat the oven to 170C and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Then take out the checkered log and slice into 1/3 inch thick slices. Place on the baking sheet 1/2 an inch apart, and bake for 12-15 minutes until the edges are a light golden brown. Cool for 10 minutes on the baking sheet before removing to a wire rack to cool completely. Repeat with the rest of the log and the marbled log as well.

The ends of the log always bake up a little garbled.

Store in an airtight container and eat over the course of a week. 

Brownie Truffles (Or Truffle Brownies ?)

Chinese New Year is in five days, new clothes have been purchased, the goodies are being given and I am annoyed.

The cookie making in my kitchen has been in full swing for the past week. Today saw me baking another batch of chocolate chip cookies (of which the recipe I am scared to post since so many blogs in the blogosphere have so many brilliant recipes) to be given as gifts. I have previously made chocolate chip and walnut cookies, madeleines and some checkerboard cookies of which the recipe I shall be posting soon. Normally I don't mind the baking but there was a miscommunication (who says grown ups have their head screwed on right, huh ?) which had me running around the kitchen making all three types of said cookies in one day. Then there was another miscommunication today (with the same person) which had me in the kitchen making yet another batch of chocolate chippies when I could've just mashed the two separate batches into one. Needless to say, I am up to my eyeballs in cookies and chocolate chips. 

I could either get mad or get over it. I decided to drown myself in chocolate. Thank god for the pan of brownies I had the foresight to make yesterday.

Actually it wasn't. Foresight, that is. I just saw the picture of some brownies and then the words melt in your mouth and truffle caught my eye and took over my mind and before I knew it, I was at the stove, stirring away. I made a really small batch (the original recipe yields a 9 by 5 inch block. This is small by my standards because my brownies used to measure 9 by 13 inches huge) and then stashed it in the fridge in anticipation for the cutting.

The brownies came in handy today when I was tired and covered in butter and had chocolate chips strewn in random places in the kitchen. The fact that ilovebrowniesmorethananythinginthewholewideworld and that these particular ones were gooey and more fudge than brownie helped a lot, I suppose.

Now there are two sides to the brownie world: fudgy versus cakey. I am so deep in the fudgy camp that I want my brownies bordering on fudge. As in stick-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth-and-can-only-be-washed-down-with-a-glass-of-milk type of brownie. The kind where you have to literally peel them apart after you cut them, they're so sticky. Cakey brownies have no room in my heart. Or kitchen.

And these are by far the fudgiest brownies I have ever made or eaten. And believe me, I have made (and eaten) a lot of brownies.

Dense slabs of chocolate, these are. They began to soften due to the heat of my hands (I had to maneuver them to get the best pictures) and when I took a bite, they practically melted away. Not your average run-of-the-mill brownie :)

They stuck to everything. My knife, my fingers, the plate. While licking the plate and fingers are perfectly acceptable behaviour, I strongly discourage licking the knife. That would be very stupid. Just cut yourself another piece.

Melt-In-Your-Mouth Brownie Truffles

Adapted from this site.

1/3 cup whole milk

1/4 cup caster sugar

1/2 tsp sea salt

100g dark chocolate, chopped 

90g butter

1 egg, beaten

1 tsp vanilla extract

2 tsp flour
Cocoa powder, to coat (optional)

1. Preheat the oven to 180C and line a 9 by 5 inch pan with parchment paper.

2. Place the milk, sugar and salt in a saucepan over medium low heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Don't let it boil ! Once the sugar and salt are dissolved, stir in the chocolate.

3. When the chocolate has melted, stir in the butter until it melts. It should look like a yummy chocolate sauce at this point. Stir in the vanilla and the egg just till it's mixed in. Don't beat too much, you don't want to aerate the mixture. We're going for fudgy here, people. 

4. Stir in the flour until no streaks of white remain. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 20-25 minutes, until set. Immediately pop it into the fridge and leave to chill until the next day (makes it easier to cut, trust me).

5. Lift the brownies out of the pan and cut into 1 inch squares. You can make them smaller if you want, they're really rich. The original recipe said to roll them in cocoa powder like you would for truffles, and I recommend that because I think the cocoa would provide another layer of chocolatey-ness and make it looks really elegant. So pour some cocoa powder into a shallow dish and roll the brownie truffles around in them to coat. As you can see, I left mine I coated because one: I'm lazy and two: I needed my brownie fix NOW. 

Chocolate Snowskin Mooncakes with Custard Filling

I love to read. Have I said that before ? I'll read anything from the old tattered paperback I picked up in a secondhand bookstore in Thailand to the labels on the mustard in my fridge. Sometimes when I get bored brushing my teeth, I'll read what it says on my toothpaste.

So it wasn't a surprise that when I went to a huge bookstore that I haven't been to in a while, I managed to mentally list down a dozen books that I wanted in the first ten minutes.. And then that list went out of the window when my sister came to announce that the comic version of a video game I was playing was finally available. I grabbed the books and probably squealed some but they're mine now ! I may sound like a complete geek/bookworm/weirdo(?) but I've been waiting for those books since I was 13, mind you.

I've had my nose buried in those comics and a few books that I bought recently for the past few days. I only surfaced to make these mooncakes and even they require no baking. These mooncakes are linked to the Mooncake Festival that all Chinese celebrate - the mooncakes were used as a means of communication during a times of tyranny, if I'm not mistaken. There are two kinds too, baked and chilled. My sister loves the chilled one (as so I, but then again I love all kinds of moon cake) and since these days there are all kinds of flavours from tiramisu to bacon (!) mooncakes, it seemed completely normal to make a chocolate one. Besides, I've had this recipe bookmarked for quite a while now. 

And just for the record, Mooncake Festival is in September. I have really inappropriate timing.

I had a few issues with the recipe though. Maybe it was the ratio of skin to filling that I used, but I just couldn't get that tiny piece of skin to wrap around that enormous ball of filling properly, so I used a one to one ratio. Which of course, led to me having not enough skin to cover all the filling. Doesn't matter, they were both tasty and it didn't take long for my sister and me to nosh our way through. 

I might have steamed the filling too long too, since it wasn't exactly stirrable, more like a set custard.. Oops. I blame the comics.

Chocolate Snowskin Mooncakes with Custard Filling

Adapted from this site who got the skin recipe from here and the filling from here.

For the snowskin:

130ml water

70g sugar

50g dark chocolate, chopped

10g cocoa powder

10g chocolate paste (I had no idea what this was so I used chocolate emulco)

20g shortening

60g Koh fen

1. Heat the water and sugar until dissolved, then add the cocoa powder and chocolate paste. Mix well, then add the chocolate and stir to melt.

2. Put the Koh fen into a bowl and use your fingers to rub in the shortening until it resembled breadcrumbs. Slowly pour in the chocolate mixture until it comes together into a dough. You might not need all of the chocolate mixture so go slowly. Knead a little to combine then cover and rest for 1/2 hour.

For the custard filling:

5 eggs

160g sugar

120g butter

50g flour

40g cornflour

50g milk powder

50g custard powder

70g condensed milk

150g evaporated/coconut milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Cream the sugar and butter together until combined. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well before adding the next egg. The mixture might look rather curdled but don't worry, it'll come together later.

2. Stir together the flour, cornflour, milk powder and custard powder. In another bowl, stir together the condensed milk and evaporated/coconut milk. Add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture alternately with the milk mixture. Mix until smooth.

3. Pour the mixture into a nonstick pot and cook over medium heat until thick and coats the back of a wooden spoon. Strain the mixture into a bowl, then steam it over medium-high heat for 25-30 minutes, until set.

4. Stir it until it becomes a thick paste. Mine was rather solid after steaming (I might have steamed it a tad too long - don't make my mistake !) so I just kneaded it into balls. Leave to cool.

To assemble, use a 1:2 ratio, that is 25g of skin to 50g of filling. Flatten the skin and place a ball of the filling in the middle, the wrap the skin around it. Roll it in your hands to form a smooth ball, then press into mooncake molds to form the traditional mooncake shapes. Chill the mooncakes before serving.

Matcha Brioche Buns

Hello. It is currently 11.14pm on a Friday night and I am in my room with the lights off and partially hidden under my blanket as I type this because I cannot, for the life of me, fall asleep. 

This might not seem like a big deal to you because it isn't even past midnight yet. Technically it wouldn't usually be that big of a deal to me either because usually I'm still up at this time on Friday nights. On my iPad. On that evil site they call Pinterest. Oh... I gotta tell you. The hours just fly by every time I refresh that page.

Anyway it is a big deal to me now because last night, I couldn't sleep either. And to top it off, I woke up before 5am. I always go for a jog or cycle in the mornings so I gave up staring at the ceiling and just pulled on my shoes (after showering and changing out of my pajamas of course) and hit the ground running. I got through the day just fine, and even met up with a friend of a friend that I met through Instagram. It was totally random. We just decided we'd meet up and go for dessert. Which is my absolute favorite thing to do. Other than having dessert for dinner of course..

Then I came home and got sleepy around 8. I climbed into bed around 9 because you know, I thought going to bed earlier would justify me not getting enough sleep the night before. Repaying my sleep debt and all that. But nope, I ended up tossing and turning and dreaming of my days of interning in Shangri-la. Don't ask me why, I think it had something to do with the copious amounts of cake and sweets I ate when I was there. As if dessert today wasn't enough.

And I didn't actually make these matcha brioche buns today. I only decided to blog about them now because.. I think you get it by now.

I first saw them on foodbeam a little while ago, while I was - you guessed it - hopping around on Pinterest. They looked so lovely and matcha is also one of my favorite flavours so I bookmarked it and proceeded to forget about it until recently when I thought it would be a great idea to start baking bread again. Mine are nowhere as lovely as Fanny's, though.

And I'm sorry about the horrible photos. It was nighttime by the time the buns came out of the oven and my dad was hovering eagerly around the tray, asking every two minutes if I was done taking pictures because he wanted to try just one while they were still warm. I eventually gave up trying to take pretty pictures (I was practically in the sink trying to get the best-lit shot of them) and just handed him a plate. Needless to say, he went to town with them, the bread-fiend.

I didn't shape them the way Fanny did too. The filling sort of oozed out so I just cut them up, twisted them and placed them into muffin tins. Then I smeared some of the matcha filling on top because hey, why waste a good thing ? And trust me, while they're not the simplest thing to make, they're pretty damn easy to eat. And they smell good too, when they're almost done baking. Kind of like cinnamon rolls. Only without the cinnamon.

They're not flaky like croissants but they have the layers of soft pillowy bread and yummy matcha cream throughout. I don't know about you, but I love anything with layers in them.. Layered cakes, buns, pastries.. The cafeteria at Shangri-la had croissants and, on the rare occasion, cinnamon rolls. I used to eat nearly three four five of those croissants in one sitting. Okay, they were quite small, maybe around two to three inches long but the cinnamon rolls were huge. Think maybe the size of your head huge. And I had two. The first was split quite modestly with a friend who watched me eat said croissants.. And the second, I attempted to split with him. I ended up eating most of it. No wonder I had trouble pulling on my jeans after that.

Oh, I don't know if you've heard, but apparently one of the reasons you can't fall asleep (aside from massive caffeine consumption prior to bedtime, but I am no caffeine addict) is because, I quote, "you're awake in someone else's dreams." Yup, I got that from Pinterest too.

Do I believe that ? I'd like to. But unfortunately every time I can't sleep, it's because someone else is in my dream. Okay, daydream since I'm not actually sleeping. But shouldn't it be a nightdream since it's dark ?

Look at all those italics. I think I should stop now.

For the recipe and even a drawing tutorial on how to make and shape these matcha brioches, visit Fanny at her site, foodbeam here. Her pictures and prose are really something, I tell you.

11.54pm. Going to try to sleep now.

Peanut Butter and Jelly Macarons

Ah, the macaron. 

To be honest, I was late getting onto the macaron bandwagon. When everyone was fussing and cooing over these little cookies that sold for 10 ringgit each, I was busy baking up brownies and cheesecakes. I just didn't see the appeal of them. Another factor was that I had an ex boyfriend that was just macaron-obsessed to the point where he talked about them all the time. He'd been to France before and managed to convince everyone, me included, that he could make the best macarons ever. And when we (we being me and him and a few friends of ours) went over to his house for a lesson on baking macarons, the results were stuck to the baking sheet. Which inevitably ended with me peeling macaron shells off the baking sheet and popping them into my mouth between bites of (storebought - Betty Crocker to be exact) frosting.

So when it ended between us, it ended between me and the macaron as well. I went crawling back to the ubiquitous fudge brownie for comfort. Didn't you know chocolate heals anything ? Speaking of chocolate/brownies, I just realized that I haven't posted a recipe for brownies yet. I'll be sure to fix that soon.

Anyway when my friend contacted me recently, saying he had found a little patisserie that sold the best macarons he had ever tasted, I was intrigued. For one, he didn't strike me as someone who had a big sweet tooth (unlike me, I practically have sweet teeth) and I wanted to try a macaron that I wouldn't have to scrape off a surface with a spoon. So I hopped into his car and we drove off to a quaint little place and ate ourselves silly. 

I didn't manage to get a picture of all the things we ate - I was too busy shoveling cake into my face. I was hungry.

They have wonderful cakes. Between the two of us, we managed ten kinds. Ad about seven macarons. There was even a white truffle one. The only experience I had with white truffle was when I was still an intern in the hotel. I was cooking risotto for the arancini, and unbeknownst to me, my friend had poured some truffle oil liberally into the mixture before frying it. In my defense, the risotto had been taken from my hands as soon as it was al dente, so when I happily grabbed a few of the arancini and put them in my gob, I wasn't expecting the burst of truffle-stink that hit me in the head. It's an acquired taste.. And I've yet to acquire it.

But I digress. The macarons I tried the other day were more than enough to convince me that I had to make some as soon as freakin' possible.

I've tried making macarons before. And they were always disappointing, either becoming too crispy or just baking up completely devoid of 'feet'. They were tasty, but at that time I would rather spend my daily quota of sugar on something else. That was before I had the chance to eat any that was worth mentioning.

My first macarons were some pistachio ones (recipe later) that I made for my cousin. They came out pretty enough, but some were a little lopsided and they still had the quirky, homemade look to them. The rest of the times I tried making them after that just baked up funny (the shells cracked and sort of imploded). So when I found this recipe in one of the cookbooks that I had squirreled away, I wasn't expecting much. I just threw (Figure of speech. Don't do that. Be gentle) them in the oven and prayed feet feet feet please let them grow feet.

And grow feet they did.

I made them in the flavones of peanut butter and jelly because I've always loved the combination. I would like to say that they were the flavours I grew up with but sadly, that isn't true. The sandwiches I grew up with had jelly but used sliced cheese instead of the peanut butter. Odd, but yummy.

It's a good idea to draw rings of peanut butter filling around the edge first before you fill them with jam. That way they won't slide around so much.

For the best authority on macaron making, refer to this post here or here. Two of my favorite bloggers will walk you through the process better than I can :)

Peanut Butter and Jelly Macarons (makes 13 macarons)

For the macaron shells:

15g almond flour

25g peanuts

80g icing sugar

40g egg whites

20g caster sugar

For the peanut butter filling:

15g butter

60g peanut butter

20g icing sugar

1/2 tbsp milk

To assemble: 

Any jam of your choice (I used blackberry)

1. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

2. Make the macaron shells. Put the almond flour, peanuts and icing sugar in a blender or food processor, blend until very finely ground (but not so much that you get peanut butter). Sieve into a bowl and set this aside.

3. Whip the egg whites until soft peaks form (where you can hold up the whisk and the whites droop off in a soft peak, hence the name). Slowly add the sugar while whisking, then whip till you get firm, glossy peaks (when you hold up the whisk, the whites stand in a firm peak that doesn't droop). I do this by hand since it isn't much to whip and I'm terrified I'll over whip them in my mixer.

4. Sieve half of the ground peanut mixture over the whites. Gently fold them in using a spatula, then sift over the remaining ground peanut mixture. Fold it in until well combined. 

5. Then using the spatula, stir the batter while pressing it against the side of the bowl to deflate it ever so slightly. You want to get the right piping consistency, that is when you lift the spatula and draw a figure eight with the batter, it disappears into itself within 20 seconds. The texture of it will be like chorus pastry dough. It takes a little practice but you'll get the hang of it soon enough :)

6. Put the batter into a piping bag and snip a 1cm opening. Pipe 1 inch circles on the parchment lined baking sheet, spacing them 1/2 an inch apart. Set them aside in a cool, dry place to dry for at least 45 minutes. They will form a shell - you can tell by touching them lightly with your finger. The batter shouldn't stick to your finger and it'll have a crust of sorts. Leave them to dry longer if necessary, it can take up to two hours. Don't rush this, believe me, I learnt it the hard way.

7. Preheat the oven to 155C. When the macarons have formed a shell, bake them for 10-12 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through. Let them cool on the baking sheet. The shells should peel off the parchment paper easily when they're cool, if not, just pop them back in the oven for another 3-5 minutes. Let them cool completely before filling.

8. To make the filling, cream the butter and peanut butter together using a hand mixer. Add the icing sugar and beat till blended, then beat in the milk until fluffy. Put this mixture into a piping bag and snip off the end, then pipe circles of peanut butter filling onto half the cooled macaron shells. You want to pipe circles only around the edges of the shells to form a kind of frame. This will hold in the jam.

9. Stir the jam a little to loosen it, then use a teaspoon to dollop around 1/2 tsp of jam in the middle of the ring of peanut butter filling (if you get confused, just look at the pictures above again). 

10. Use the other half of the macaron shells to sandwich the filled ones - pressing them together lightly until the filling comes to the edges of the macaron (don't squash the filling out though). Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Some recipes say to let them mature for a day before eating, since they do taste better the next day when the shells are crisp on the outside but the centers have softened slightly. It's up to you though, I'd eat them as soon as they're filled.