Macarons

I never grew up knowing macarons. Mother never made or buy them. Its only after I have started working and could enjoy high tea with friends at the hotel, I knew of the existence of macarons and always loved them especially if it comes on the cakes.
I was so happy and fortunate that I got to learn to make this myself plus the kids like it too. Its quite expensive to buy it from the store if I want to buy a lot for a party, it leaves a dent on my pocket...hahahahaha.

Macarons

Ingredients

For meringue
90 gm egg white
90 gm granulated sugar
90 gm icing sugar
105 gm almond powder (almond meal)
Few drops of red colouring

For Filling

60gm fresh cream
150gm white chocolate
1 1/2 teaspoon strawberry powder or 1/3 teaspoon strawberry essence


Method:

1. Sieve icing sugar and almond powder in a bowl. Do this twice.
2. Beat egg white till foamy and add half sugar and beat till soft peaks form.
3. Add the balance of sugar and continue to beat until stiff.
4. Fold in the sieved sugar and almond powder to the egg mixture and mix well.
5. Add the red colouring and fold the mixture gently until combine.
6. Put dough in a piping bag with a 2 cm plain tube. Pipe a 4 cm round and 2cm apart onto a baking tray that have been lined with greased paper.
7. Tap the tray gently so that the mixture spread nicely and leave it to stand for 20 minutes or longer until it becomes dry and when you touch them it will not dirty your finger.
8. Bake in a preheated oven 140C for 15-20 minutes. Let it cool on the baking tray.


For filling:-

1. In a saucepan heat the fresh cream until boil and remove from heat. Add the chopped white chocolate. Stir until smooth. Add the strawberry flavouring.
2. Keep the mixture in the refrigerator until cool or until mixture is spreadable.
3. Put mixture in a piping bag and pipe it onto the macarons and sandwich them.

Note: you can divide the meringue mixture into 3 parts and add colouring as you like. Do the same for the filling and just add other flavouring i.e. mango, lemon, coffee or simply plain. You will definitely enjoy the arrays of coloured macarons on the table as I did.
You can also sprinkle cocoa powder, instant coffee, chopped chocolate on the meringue mixture after piping them to give your meringue a more appealing look or just leave it plain.