Macarons

A giveaway, a recipe, and some reasons to love macarons and try making your own!

If you know me at all, you know I LOVE  good macarons! When I was a little girl, my best friend’s mom would make them for us…we moved away, and I forgot about those sweet little treats, until French Immersion days in High School, and I fell in love with them again.  But, they were hard to find and very expensive.  Now, they are all over the place, but, there are some that just don’t cut it.  They are too dry, not “chewy” inside, the cream isn’t right, or the almond flour isn’t fine enough.

Macarons are awesome treats to have at your party or get together, but they are still a little pricey for the Everyday Party person.  They are, I’ll admit, maybe a tad intimidating to make, but, Mindy from Creative Juice promises they aren’t that hard.  In her new book, Gourmet Macarons, she shares 75 recipes and fillings with a CD template for making fun shapes!

Keep reading for more amazing images by Mindy, a recipe you will LOVE, AND enter to win an e-book copy of Gourmet Macarons for yourself!!!!

All images and recipes belong to Mindy from Creative Juice.

 

About the book 

• A unique and creative spin on a classic French cookie
• It includes recipes, techniques, styling ideas, templates, and decorating tips that give the popular classic French macaron sandwich cookie a modern and whimsical makeover
• Over 75 unique and creative designs to make your French macarons delicious AND adorable for any holiday, season, or life celebration.
• Over 75 flavorful filling recipes
• CD included with the book that has printable templates to make piping circles or unique shapes so much easier
• Using this book you are no longer confined to the conventional circular shape! You can make apples, pumpkins, ghosts, trees, flowers, animals, cupcakes, and many other shapes to fit each season, holiday, or life celebration.

About the author

• Mindy is an entertaining, food, and party stylist on the blog Creative Juice. She writes about how to entertain your guests and kids with style and creativity! She shares diy tutorials, recipes, tips, tricks, and ideas to make your next event detailed, personalized, and of course creative!

 

Recipe – Chocolate French Macarons with chocolate ganache filling

Modified from the book (some tips, tricks, and terminology excluded)

Free 1.5 in circle template download for this recipe: https://www.getcreativejuice.com/2013/08/macarons-basic-printable-template.html

 

Chocolate French Macarons

100g of egg whites aged at room temperature

Pinch of Cream of tartar

35g of superfine sugar

110g of Almond flour

200g of Powdered Sugar

10g cocoa powder

1. Measure out all ingredients using a gram scale

2. Prepare the baking sheets by lining them with a silicone mat or parchment paper. Slide a printed 1 ½ inch template sheet underneath and set aside. Prepare piping bag to be filled and set aside.

3. Sift powdered sugar, almond mixture, and cocoa powder together two or three times through a sieve and set aside.

4. Place the egg whites in a large bowl or in stand mixer with wire whisk attachment. Whisk on low until egg whites become foamy. Add the pinch of cream of tartar. Continue to whisk until soft peaks form. Slowly add in the superfine sugar. Once all of the sugar is incorporated, scrape down the sides with a spatula.

5. Turn your mixer on medium-high and continue to whisk until you reach a stiff meringue. If adding liquid or gel food dye, do so toward the end of whisking.

6. Sift 1/3 of the almond flour, powdered sugar, and cocoa powder mixture through the sieve and into the meringue. Fold the dry mixture into the meringue. Repeat with the remaining mixture. Once all of the dry ingredients are incorporated, the batter will be thick and have a dull shine. Continue to fold. As you do so, the batter will loosen. Stop folding when the batter has a glossy sheen, a “lava-like” consistency, and falls in a ribbon like manner off the spatula.

7. Transfer the batter into a large pastry bag fitted with a round tip and pipe 1½ inch rounds on the parchment paper following the template.

8. When all of the rounds are piped on the parchment, rap the sheet pans evenly on work surface a few times. Remove templates from below your parchment paper carefully. Let the batter rest at room temperature for 20-40 minutes.

9. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Reduce temperature to 300 degrees and bake one sheet at a time for 12 minutes rotating the pan half way through.

10.  Remove from oven and allow to cool.

11.  Match up similar size shells into pairs and sandwich with filling.

MAKES:

About 4 dozen 1.5 in shells (two dozen sandwiched macaron cookies)

 

Chocolate Ganache Filling 

100 g (3.5 oz) chocolate*

1½ Tbsp. heavy cream

Place chocolate in a heat proof bowl.

Boil cream and pour over chocolate.

Stir until all the chocolate has melted and texture is smooth**

When warm, pipe onto macaron shells.

*I prefer to use the mini chocolate chips when possible to speed up the process.

** If the cream is not able to melt all the chocolate, place bowl in microwave. Heat for 20 seconds on low power. Remove and stir. Repeat until chocolate is fully melted.

 

Enter below for a chance to win your own e-book copy of Mindy’s book, Gourmet Macarons

 CONGRATULATIONS TO THE WINNER!

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