YAYYYYY, the macarons-making blog entry is finally done =) So excited to share this recipe with you guys! It was my very first attempt at making macarons but we had MasterChef YL with us that day to guide and help us since she already had experience making them!!
Got up bright and early to get the necessary materials for our macarons. We got the ingredients from both Phoon Huat and NTUC Fairprice =)
Reading YL's recipe off the computer. High-tech right? Lol.
Some of the main ingredients we used
Target number of macarons: 50-60 round macarons of normal sizes
TIP: Do make the filling before the macaron shells ;)
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Macaron Shells
110 grams almond flour
190 grams icing sugar
2 tea spoon espresso powder (optional)
10 grams cocoa powder
100 grams aged egg whites (room temperature)
50 grams granulated / caster sugar
Weigh the almond flour, icing sugar, cocoa powder, caster sugar according to the weight mentioned above
Optional step: Dry the grounded almond flour in the oven for a couple of minutes
Mix the almond flour, icing sugar and cocoa powder and place the mixture in a food processor and blitz for several seconds to break up any lumps. It is essential to remove the lumps so that there will not be any bumps on top of the macarons.
Sift the almond flour, icing sugar and cocoa powder in a large bowl.
In a clean, dry, oil-free bowl, add in the egg whites.
Using an electric mixer, turn the speed to low and whisk the egg whites for 10 seconds.
Increase the speed up to high and whisk for another 30 seconds, until the egg whites and foamy and white in colour.
Add in the caster sugar – 1 tablespoon at a time – and whisk for 30 seconds (on high speed) before adding the next tablespoon.
Continue whisking on high speed until the meringue is white, shiny and forms stiff peaks.
To check for stiff peaks, turn off the electric mixer and lift it up and turn it upside down. If the meringue remains vertical and did not droop down (see pic below), the meringue is ready. If not, continue whisking and check frequently – you don’t want to overwhisk the egg whites.
Once the meringue is ready, add in the almond flour- icing sugar-cocoa powder mixture all at once.
Using a large rubber spatula, fold in the dry ingredients until no streaks of dry ingredients remained. Do scrape the sides frequently to incorporate all the dry ingredients. The batter should be shiny, sticky, thick but liquid (this is what they like to call “lava” like batter): scoop up some batter and drop some it on to itself, the dropped batter should slowly sink and merge back with the remaining batter in more than 5 seconds but less than 20-30 seconds. If it sinks and merge back within 5 seconds, it is likely that you have over-mixed the batter. If it doesn’t sink back, fold a few more times, and test again. It is a tricky balance – you can’t under-fold and you can’t over-fold either.
Line several baking sheets with baking parchment. Transfer the batter into a large piping bag with a plain tip. The batter should flow out easily. Pipe small rounds of batter (about 1-inch in diameter) onto the baking sheets, leaving a 1.5-inch spacing in between.
After piping, tap the sheets on the table counter (aka bang the tray up and down) to release air bubbles and to flatten the shells.
Use a tooth-pick to remove the air bubbles (especially the big ones) and a small spatula to smooth out the tops. This step is optional but it does help to give you prettier macaron shells.
(optional) If round macaron shells are too boring for you, try new shapes like we did! We did heart, fish and bunny shapes. hehehe.
Let the macarons rest for 45 minutes.
Touch them gently (top and the sides) – they should not be tacky / sticky and they should not be shiny-looking.
Preheat the oven to 150 degrees Celsius.
Bake the macarons, one sheet at a time, for 10 minutes.
Then rotate the sheets 180 degrees and bake for another 8 minutes until the top is crisp and the feet do not wobble – touch the top gently and if you see the feet shaking, they are not ready yet – bake and check every 1 minute.
Place the baking sheet on a wire rack. Let the macarons cool for 5 minutes. Slide the parchment paper of macrons onto a damp tea towel. The thermal shock (hot from the macarons and cold from the damp tea towel) will help to release the macarons from the baking parchment.
(Note: This is a step we did not do. We simply place the hot macarons on the table top to cool)
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Filling preparation
Chocolate Ganache
115 grams chocolate, finely chopped
125 ml heavy/thickened cream
15 grams unsalted butter, diced
1 teaspoon of espresso
Place the chopped chocolate in a heat-proof bowl.
Pour 125ml of heavy/thickened cream in a small pot and heat over medium heat until the heavy cream comes to a simmer (small bubbles appear on the sides of the pot).
Pour the hot cream onto the chocolate and let it stand for 1 minute.
Stir the mixture until all the chocolate has melted and the mixture is smooth.
Add in 15g of unsalted butter and stir until all the butter has melted.
Let the mixture cool at room temperature until the ganache has thickened.
You can place it in the fridge to speed up the process.
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Salted Caramel
125g heavy/thickened cream
175g castor sugar (fine granulated sugar)
5g fleur de sel
175g butter, cut into small cubes
Weigh and pour 175g of caster sugar into a medium saucepan.
Begin cooking the sugar, stirring occasionally so it caramelizes evenly.
Weigh 125g of thickened/heavy cream.
Cook cream until it just begins to boil, then remove from heat.
Once the sugar reaches a dark copper color, remove from heat and pour in hot cream, continuing to stir with a spatula.
Let mixture cool to around 115°F. Add fleur de sel and salted butter, a few cubes at a time, while continuing to stir the caramel.
Once all the butter has been incorporated, pour the caramel into a shallow container and let cool in the fridge.
Once cooled, beat the mixture until light, shiny and smooth. Store in fridge until your macarons are baked and completely cooled.
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Piping filling to macaron shells
Pair the macarons so that the same size ones are matched together.
Pipe the prepared chocolate ganache to the middle of a macaron shell.
Sandwich with the other macaron – gently twisting and pressing it down until the ganache extends to the edge of the macaron.
Once your macarons are done, when is the best time to consume them? DEFINITELY NOT IMMEDIATELY!!
By the time you finish piping the filling to the macaron shells, the former would have "melted' and turns all runny (ours sure did!) Hence, place the macarons in a container and refrigerate them for 24 hours to help the flavours meld together. Before consumption, take them out of the fridge 10- 15 minutes beforehand and let them cool at room temperature.
Our macarons were not the prettiest-looking ones but they really tasted good!! Therefore, i hope this recipe will help you guys out there who wants to give macarons-baking a try!! =)
Until next time~
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