Who wants macarons?

Love sweet? Check out the burger-like, French cream-filled sandwich cookie macarons! Macarons are a French sandwich-like pastry with two-thin cookies and a cream in between. The macarons are a simple combination of ground almonds, egg whites, and sugar. They have crispy crusts and chewy-moist on the interior, these treats need no filling to be absolutely delicious. 

They come with different colors and flavors. Mouth-watering huh? :)

Credits to: The Nooblet Patissier

My dad actually bought me some macarons from Natalie's Gourmet Studio and it tastes like HEAVEN! I personally dislike the pink macaron (see below) because it tastes like Lovely Lace. It's the flavor of rose by  the way.

Here is it! I can't really recognize all of the flavors, for me they were all taste like ginger :p 

For your information, Natalie's Gourmet Studio does offer some cooking classes like macaron-making courses. Well, a typical college student like me is very lazy busy and I bet the fees will cost me a bomb! Okay so plan A failed. Saw a strawberry macarons recipe  from Croissant & Parmesan, very tempting! I wonder why there is no watermelon-flavored macaron in this world, nobody will do that except me! (For your information, Imma watermelon freak :) So here's my plan B: To DIY watermelon macaron during FREE TIME.

And so, here's the recipe of strawberry macarons, you guys should really try it out!

Strawberry macaron

Ingredients for the macarons shells (around 30-40 macarons):

• 200 g dried almonds powder
• 200 g confectioners’ sugar (or ice sugar)
• 200 g sugar in powder
• 2 * 75 g eggwhites
• 50 ml water

1. Put the almonds and confectioners’ sugar together in the blender and mix. This «pasta» is called the tant pour tant (TPT) because there is as much as sugar as almonds powder. Reserve in a bowl.
2. In a pot pour 160 g of sugar in powder, add the water but do not mix. Bring to a temperature of 115°C.
3. Meanwhile beat the eggwhites (75 g) with the remaining sugar until stiff (the mix should be consistant but not too much, just avoid the beaten eggwhites form a beak)
4. Still beating the eggwhite, pour the boiling sugar. Mix until the temperature reaches down 40°C (or no temperature sensation on your finger). This process (2 to 4) is the so called meringue italienne.
5. At that moment add the remaining eggwhites (the unbeaten ones) to the TPT. Mix gently. Add a third of the meringue to make it more supple. Mix gently and add the rest of the meringue. Mix softly. The final TPT should be quite soft but not liquid (literally it has to do a ribbon)! a tip from tartelette : Test a small amount of pasta on a plate: if the tops flattens on its own you are good to go. If there is a small beak, give the batter a couple of turns.
6. Fill a pastry bag with a piping nozzle of size 6 or 8 (diameter in mm). Pip small rounds onto parchment paper. Space the shells (coques) by 2 cm at least (as seen in the following picture). Let them sit out at least 15-20 mns
7. Meanwhile warm up the oven at 150°C.
8. After 15-20 mns, put the macarons in the oven for 12-15 mns, depending of the size (1 parchement paper at a time or the shells break). Let cool before removing.

Strawberry ganache

• 300 g of white chocolate
• 300 g strawberryies

1. Slice finely the white chocolateand reserve in a bowl.
2. Wash and clean the strawberries. Put them in a pot and mix into a purée.
3. Over low heat  ccok the purée (makesure it does not boil!)
4. Sieve the purée over the chocolate and mix gently.
5. Refrigerate the strawberry ganache for at least 3 hours(it takes quite a time to get thick)
6. When it is cold and consistant, fill a pastry bag with the ganache
7. Pipe the ganache on the center of the shell and top with another one (if you don’t put enough ganache the shells will dry!)
8. Keep the macarons in the fridge for a couple of hours

Recommendation:  

-Do a preliminary test by putting only 5-6 shells in the oven. If you have trouble removing the shells after the cooking then let themc ook a little more. If they are cracked decrease the oven’s temperature.

-Also if you want to avoid to do the macaron shells with the meringue italienne, more difficult, go see the blog of tartelette, she explains pretty well how to do macarons shells with simple meringue.

Photo and recipe taken from Croissant & Parmesan