macaron au chocolat

[ellencho]

This is for you vsoy! Sorry it took so long to post.

So macarons and macaroons are somewhat similar, but are quite different. They're both cookies, both are mainly made of some sort of nut, egg white, and sweeteners. In the case of the macaron, it's a light cookie, usually made with an almond flour,

The recipe I use is one by Pierre Herme. He's a fancy-pants patissier in France and is known for his macarons.

It's best to measure out your ingredients with a scale, but if you don't have one I've also included the volumetric measurements. Lastly, almond flour is expensive. Like 10 bucks a lb. I realize that while I will splurge on luxury items every now and then, 10 bucks for a lb of almond flour that will rapidly spoil if not used quickly is too much.

What I do instead is go to Trader Joe's buy a 4 dollar bag of almond meal, grind it finely in a food processor or coffee grinder, and then sift and save the finer particles. Of course, the finer the almonds are ground, the more delicate the final product, but I sort of like the mouthfeel of the slightly coarser homemade almond flour that I use.

What you will need:
140 grams (1 1/3 cups) of finely ground almond flour
250 grams (2 cups plus 2 Tb) confectioners' sugar
25 grams (1/4 cup) dutch-processed cocoa powder, plus more for dusting
100 grams (1/2 cup) egg whites (about 4 or 5 egg whites) allowed to sit out at room temp for 3-5 days, I know this sounds cuckoo but for some reason they make for a better macaron.
5 ounces bittersweet or semi sweet chocolate, chopped finely - don't use chips
4 ounces heavy cream

1. To make the ganache filling between the cookies heat up the heavy cream in a small saucepan, to a simmer, but not to a boil. Turn off heat, and add chocolate, stirring to combine. Allow to cool to room temperature. It's best to make this either before you start the batter or after you spoon out the batter.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1697.jpg
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1701.jpg
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2. Line 2 large cookie sheets with parchment paper.

3. Sift your almond flour, confectioners' sugar and cocoa together.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1681.jpg
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1684.jpg

Whip up your eggs on high until they form a peak that droops a little bit.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1685.jpg
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1683.jpg

4. Add your dry ingredients to your egg whites and fold to combine. It might seem as if the egg whites are deflating, but that's ok. You want some of it to deflate. If you're batter's a bit runny, that's fine too.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1686.jpg
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1690.jpg

5. Now you're ready to spoon out your batter. Go with a Tb of batter per cookie and keep spooning out till you run out of batter leaving about an inch bewteen each cookie. Since pairs of cookies will be used to make a sandwich, make sure they're all relatively the same size.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1692.jpg

6. Once the batter has been properly aliquotted (hehe I used aliquotted) get yourself a little bowl of warm water, and with a damp fingertip use the water to help smooth out the shape of the cookies. Now allow these cookies to sit out for a couple hours (I usually let mine sit for about 5 hours).
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1693.jpg

7. When you're ready to bake, set your oven to 425 F and lightly dust the tops of your cookies with cocoa powder. Bake only one cookie sheet at a time. Place cookie sheet into the oven and turn the temperature down to 350 and insert the handle of a wooden spoon into the oven to keep the door slightly open. Bake 12-15 minutes or until they are smooth and firm to the touch. Transfer the cookie sheet to a cooling and turn your oven back to 425.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1716.jpg

8. To properly release the cookies from the parchment, you must work quickly. Lift up one of the corners of the sheet of parchment and pour a little hot water under the paper onto the cookie sheet, enough to create a little steam underneath the paper. Tilt the cookie sheet around to evenly distribute the steam. Let them sit for 15 seconds, then begin removing them by peeling them from the paper. Place cookies on a rack and let them cool to room temperature.
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1724.jpg
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9. Find two cookies of similar size and sandwich them together with a Tb or so of ganache. Hooray you've made macaron au chocolat!
http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a120/foxandpoo/makingmacaron/IMG_1733.jpg

[vsoy]

OMG, thank you, thank you ellen, they look delicious. :D I can't wait to try it out...have to go hunt down some almond meal/flour.

Couple of questions:
1. Won't the egg whites go bad at room temp for that long? Or do you keep the eggs out at room temp and separate them when you are ready to make the cookie part?

2. Can you freeze macarons or how do you store them? Probably I'll end up eating the first batch on the first day, but one way I prevent myself from eating everything the first day is to freeze the majority of what I make.

Your idea of using a colander/sieve to sift flour is a great idea. The sifters I've bought are always POS that break or the opening to dump stuff is so small it takes forever to sift.

heheh, you said aliquotted, you lab nerd. :wink:

[cattygurl]

You know, the best almod flour I made is just crushing almonds in my superblender. If you have a strong enough blender with a dry blade (for mixing dry stuff), you can buy almonds and crush almond flour yourself. Nut flours have high content and go rancid easily, so get small amounts, keep them doble-bagged in ziploc and frozen after opening.

[Dialectic]

Oh my god this looks so good. I'm so lazy I don't even make sandwiches anymore.

[ellencho]

1. Oddly enough, they don't go bad at all. I've left them out for five days and ended up with perfectly fine macaron. I fed them to my family, bf, and coworkers and they're still alive :) I don't even cover them up, I just leave them uncovered in my kitchen. I checked another website and this is what they say - the whites react with the CO2 in the air to form carbonic acid, which lowers the pH of the whites. When you lower the pH of the whites, you're preventing the accumulation of s-ovalbumin which is what causes the egg whites to be runny in the first place. In order to get really nicely whipped eggs you want a higher concentration of plain old ovalbumin, rather than s-ovalbumin.

2. I bet you could freeze them. I never have, but if I were to freeze them, I'd wrap each one up individually in plastic, and then store them in a big ziploc. Then when you're ready to eat, let it defrost at room temp.

[cattygurl]

It's clear. Ellen gets my vote for the first human clone.

God, I haven't ben albe to comment on how good they look...

sldkfjnsloij;slkgvns/lkbnsz /flbksnb/... I turn into a blubbering fool in front of the macaroons.

[toml]

WOW.... this looks so good!

[vsoy]

Made a batch this weekend and they were awesome. Great tutorial ellencho! While the aliquoted cookies were drying out on the counter, the hubby ate a raw one thinking it was done so I only ended up making 15 sandwiches :lol:
Looking at other websites, it seems they are best fresh and to be consumed in 3-4 days. Freezing may not be such a great idea.

[vsoy]

Hey Ellen, I made a double batch yesterday and while it was better than the first batch, I noticed some weird things about this one. Maybe you, cattygurl or someone else has some ideas?

1. The first time I made ganache, it hardened into this firm, spreadable form that was easy to work with. It was made with Ghiradelli 60% cocoa bittersweet chocolate. Yesterday's ganache thickened, but never really hardened. It was made with a bar of the Ghiradelli 60% cocoa and 2 bars of the Lindt 70% cocoa dark chocolate(didn't indicate if it was bittersweet). I think the Lindt had something to do with the consistency. I tried to use the leftover ganache to make chocolate covered pretzelsticks (the salty counteracting the sweet can be addictive) but I had a heck of a time keeping the chocolate on the pretzel. The ganache had a glistening appearance (high oil?). I just thought the differences in consistency between batches was strange.

2. After assembling the sandwiches, I left the macarons out on a cookie sheet til after dinner. When I went to put them away, some of the sandwiches had this curious greasy, oily residue on the bottom macaron. It didn't taste like anything, just didn't look very nice. Kind of a clear, slightly yellow appearance. I used almond flour that I had in the freezer, but I took it out an hour or two before sifting to thaw it out. It was only on a few cookies and always in the middle of the cookie.

BTW, siliconized parchment paper is the bomb! You can just peel the macarons right off without steaming. If some stick a tiny bit to the paper, it is always fun to scrape it off with your finger and eat it
:P

[ellencho]

I'm really not sure vsoy. If your chocolates were over oily maybe you heated up the mixture too much and separated the oils/fats from the chocolate and heavy cream?

[nekohead]

ellencho Needs to open a small RESTAURANT!!!!!!!!!!! She would be RICH!!!!$$$$$$$ :D $$$$$$$$$$$$

[BoondockSaints]

Mmmm... nice food porn.

[cattygurl]

I love silicone baing sheets. If you bake often nough, they're worth the cost!
The silicone bakewares are also awesome- one of these days, I'll have a full set.
Silpats are the most recognizable ones, but I got mine made from matfer, called exopat, for less. Matfer is a great company with a long history, and I feel that my exopats are as well made as the silpats. Cook-eze also makes good ones (from what I hear). You can find them on cooking.com or amazon.

:D

[angi]

If ellen opened a ressie, I'd be 400lbs and broke.