Sweet Treats Saturday: Chocolate Macarons

Ever since I made the peanut butter macarons a few months ago, I've had macarons on the mind.  I ordered the book Macarons by Berengere Abraham.  The instructions made macaron making look so simple, but unfortunately, my first attempt failed.

I made the chocolate macarons with chocolate ganache filling, and the instructions specified to add the cocoa powder to the egg white mixture 'until evenly dispersed.'  I flipped back and forth through the book hoping for further instructions. It seemed like adding the cocoa powder to the egg whites would be too much. Yup, that was the case.  As soon as I added the cocoa powder, the whole thing deflated.  Frustrated, I returned back to my search in the friendly blogoverse. I referred back to my old macaron recipe and back to my original inspiration, David Lebovitz.

I kept with the original ganache recipe (from the book) as I had already made it.

Chocolate Ganache
By Berengere Abraham

Ingredients:
6 oz dark chocolate
1 1/4 cups whipping cream

In a double boiler (or a bowl over simmering water), melt the chocolate.  Pour in the cream and mix until well blended.  Remove from heat and refrigerate until needed.

Just made ganache.

Ganache refrigerated while the macarons were made, during the rest, and the baking (approx. 3 hours)

French Chocolate Macarons
By David Lebovitz, slight modifications by me

Ingredients:
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 cup powdered almonds (50g sliced almonds)
3 tbsps unsweetened cocoa powder
2 large egg whites, room temperature
5 tbsps granulated sugar

Line baking sheets with parchment paper or a silpat.

Grind together the powdered sugar, almonds and cocoa powder until a fine grind.  There should be no lumps.

With an electric mixer, beat the egg whites until they are foamy and double in size.  They should be starting to hold their shape.  While whipping, gradually beat in the granulated sugar until stiff peaks are formed (about two more minutes).

Love it

Carefully fold in the dry ingredients in two batches into the egg white mixture.  When the mixture is smooth and there are no streaks of egg white, stop folding and pour into a prepped pastry bag.

Beginning to fold the powdered mixture into the egg whites

Pipe the batter onto the lined baking sheets into small circles (about 1 tbsp of batter per circle).

Just piped

David Lebovitz's recipe states to rap the sheet on the counter and place into the oven.  Based on my experiences with my previous macarons and some extra time on my hands, I decided to let them sit at room temperature for a little over an hour.

Sat on the counter for about an hour and a half

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.  Bake the macarons for 10-12 minutes.  Watch them carefully so that the tops don't crack.

Baked

Let cool completely before removing from the baking sheet.

A thing of beauty

To assemble the macarons:

Once they are fully cooled, pipe or spread the chocolate ganache onto half of the macaron shells.  Match up with the other half of the macarons.  Store in an airtight container.

Gently pipe the ganache onto one half

Pieces with the filling. Just add the tops!

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Sweet Treats Saturday: Peanut Butter Chocolate Macarons

Ahhh meringue.  It continues to scare me but I keep finding recipes involving it that look so delicious!

Macarons alone have scared me for a while, but as I love most things French, I was determined to try these too.

I was drooling over the pictures on the Annie Eats blog of her Peanut Butter Chocolate Macarons.  I had not convinced myself to try making them, especially as I saw all of the ingredients measured in grams.  I almost thought I had stumbled upon a British recipe blog.  It wasn't until I read further along that I realized they were just finicky and required exact measurements in weight.  Another ding against them.  Still, undeterred, I kept reading.

The macarons: piped, chopped peanuts added, and ready to go into the oven.

I decided to humor myself and to read her blog post about her initial experience making macarons.  Ok, now the challenge was on.  I decided I too could conquer these sweets.  But just in case of failure, I didn't plan on taking too many pictures.

The bottoms of the macarons.
Know for the future to let them set a little before putting them in the oven to avoid the tips.

The filling piped in. Chocolate fudgy ganache and peanut butter.

Ultimately, the macarons were surprisingly easy to make. They were time consuming in the multiple steps for preparation, but as long as I kept my eye on them along the way (especially in the oven so I didn't overcook them), they weren't too high maintenance.  Piping the centers was fun and the ganache was so rich and delicious.

The final macarons were light and fluffy which went perfectly with the dense and rich filling.  I'm looking forward to trying more flavor combinations and recipes for macarons.

This post will be participating in the following Linky parties:

Tatertots & Jello * Think Pink Sundays * Making the World Cuter * Just Something I Whipped Up * Made by You Mondays *Sew Cute Tuesday * Talent Tuesday * I Made This * We Did It Wednesday * Hoo’s Got Talent * Look What I Made * The Trendy Treehouse * Thrilling Thursday * It’s a Hodgepodge Friday