Recipe: French Macarons

This is a guest post by Kat about her journey cooking French macaron.

Blueberry Cheese Macarons

I got opportunity to write in my friend's blog about French macarons. So here I share the recipe to bake macaron.
It started few years ago when i ate French macarons at SweetSpot Marina Bay Sands. Ever since, I'm so crazily curious about how to make one. Finally I tried to bake one after I bought a microwave oven 1.5 years later. Since my kitchen is too small, I baked macarons using microwave oven. It should actually use a big oven.

My mom bought me a book written by an Indonesian writer about macarons recipes. Unfortunately the entire recipe written on the book are wrong because when I followed the steps in the recipe, it did not produce the macaron as I expected. The shells don't have the feet below, the top is not glossy and looks frumpy. At the end I throw away the book.

My first attempt baking macarons without any book was last year and it failed. It seemed that I over beaten the meringue so it was dry and broken and the mixture couldn't spread. So they all ended in trash.
My second attempt, the meringue is under beaten, the mixture is too flat and it didn't rise at all. The shell became flat like cookies.
This failure made me frustrated but I kept reading and looking for perfect macaron recipe. i read so many recipe and blog and try to understand how to beat the meringue until it become soft enough but not dry. How to fold in but not stir in.

So one fine Saturday night I tried to bake again and ended with successful French macarons! They had feet, smooth and glossy top, flat base and nice body. It seems to be a success case until I found out that it had air pockets when I bite. Then I searched in Google why my macarons produced airpockets and how to avoid it. Was it under mix, undercook or over beaten? So I tried again and this time I stirred not more than 50 strikes. I couldn't remember how many strikes I did but I was sure not I didn't strike it more than 50 times. The result? No more air pockets.

The method I use to cook macarons is the French method. Most people try the Italian method with great success with simmer sugar and water. The French method is more difficult but less hassle. Since I only have hand mixer I can only bake with the French one.
Some recipe says to age the white eggs for 3-5 days , some  says it doesn't really matter.
To lesser the hassle i never age the eggs. The day I want to bake the day i buy the eggs from supermarket.

So here are the ingredients.

The shell
 150 gr Egg whites
 100 gr Caster sugar
 180 gr Ground almond
 270 gr Icing sugar


Direction:

1. Begin beating the white eggs at low speed until it become foamy. Add slowly castor sugar  in the egg white then increase the speed to medium/high and beat until a firm meringue forms. One minute before become peak add the food coloring.
2. Shift the ground almond and the icing sugar.
3. Fold in the ground almond and icing sugar gradually to the egg white mixture. Do not stir in, you have to fold in from the bottom. Do not over mix as the mixture will became runny if you do so. The mixture should be like magma, flowing and shiny.
4. Put a baking sheet on a tray and using a plastic piping bag, create the shells onto a baking sheet at about 3cm wide. The mixture will spread a bit.  Some suggest using Silpat (silicone mat), but I use wax baking paper. I did try once though, using silpat, but the result wasn't good. It had fewer feet and the shell didn't rise quite well.
5. Once you've finished creating the mixture on the baking paper, tap the tray gently.
6.  Let it rest for 20-25 minutes.
7.  Bake them at 150 degree celcius for 12 mins or adjust it depending on your oven. Mine is 170 degree celcius for 15 mins.

Once the baking is done, remove it from the oven let them cool in the wire rack as the shells are not ready to eat, you'll need to pair 2 shells together, put the filling (read more about making the filling) between the shells and fridge them for about 24-72 hours.
I guess that's the reason why macarons is so pricey in store because the process take some time :D

Macaron shell

Note:
~If you don't want to be too sweet, add a pinch of salt onto the almond ground mixture.
~I only made 1/4 of this recipe ended with 15  macarons, to avoid disappointment when it fails.

Now let's make the filling
Chocolate Ganache Filling
120 gr heavy cream
240 gr dark chocolate (I combine it with white chocolate)

Direction:
Heat the cream over medium heat,  until bubbles start to form around the edge of the pan but don't let the cream boils. Remove it from the heat, add the chocolate, and let sit for 30 seconds. Slowly whisk the mixture until the chocolate is completely melted and smooth. Let it cool down in the room temperature and put in the fridge until ready to be assembled with the shells.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Filling
113 gr cream cheese
25 gr powdered sugar
1 cup fresh blueberry, chopped
1/2 half cup castor sugar
50 gr unsalted butter, softened

Direction:
1. Mix the cream, sugar and butter until smooth and fluffy.
2. Heat the chopped blueberry in medium stir, add a little bit of sugar and then heat them up until they are boiling. Once boiled, let it cool before mixing into cream mixture.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Filling

3. After it completely mixed, put into a piping bag, and it's ready to use. You can also put them in the fridge for later use.