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.
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