Macarons: cooking options

The hearts of those with a sweet tooth all over the world have been firmly conquered by the delicate French macaroon cake. Light, insanely tasty, colorful. Macarons combine a delicate cream and crispy crust to cheer you up even on the wettest day. Unfortunately, so far, this overseas delicacy is not available in all confectionery stores. It doesn't matter, this article will tell you how you can cook macarons at home.

Macaroon dough

These little rainbows liver, similar to confetti with a skirt, are popular and loved all over the world. The dough for them is a meringue with almond flour and seems to be very easy to prepare. Get truly divine to taste delicacy perhaps if the recipe is strictly followed. Macaroons are not a sweetness where you can indulge in a little improvisation. The main problem with making these cookies at home is almond flour. It is almost impossible to buy it on the territory of the Russian Federation. But it is quite possible to do on my own... You just need to take almonds and turn them into flour using a coffee grinder.

To prepare this unearthly pleasure, use 2 base recipe:

1. Italian meringue is used as a basis. More difficult to prepare, but the dough tastes better.
2. In French merengue.

By the way, meringue is actually what we used to call meringue. Whereas meringue is the cream itself, which, after baking, becomes a meringue.

Until now, it is not reliably known in which country this was born recipe... There is a legend that this delicacy was invented by the nuns of one of the monasteries in Nancy. They were motivated by a desire to diversify their meager diet and a curious theory. The essence of the theory is that girls who do not eat meat should focus on almonds. Until 1930, this dessert was prepared without filling, it was tasty, but dry. And only in the 20th century, Pierre Defontaine thought of gluing cookies together with the help of chocolate cream. By the way, there is even a special holiday in Paris - Macaroon Day.

Macaroon filling

You can use absolutely any recipe as a filling. Ganash, Kurd, jam, pasta - whatever your heart desires.

We invite you to familiarize yourself with the most delicious options for filling for macarons.

1. Chocolate ganache. Heat 90 g of heavy cream and put 90 g of any high-quality chocolate without filler (nuts, raisins, etc.). Knead until uniform. Wrap the container with cellophane and put it in the cold overnight.
2. Ganash on raspberries. Take 45 ml of 33% fat cream, 180 g of white chocolate, 100 g of puree from raspberries... Pour the cream into one bowl with the raspberries and bring to a simmer. Place the pieces of chocolate. Stir well. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate overnight.
3. Mint ganache. 50 ml cream, a couple of tsp. mint liquor and 110 g of quality white chocolate. Melt the chocolate in warm cream, pour in the liquor. Stir and refrigerate.
4. Kurd with lemon. Combine 80 ml of lemon juice with 120 g of sugar. Stir in the zest of 1 citrus. Introduce the beaten egg and place in the water bath. When the mixture thickens, remove from heat and suck. Then add 125 g soft butter and shake. Let it brew in the cold overnight.

How to cook macaroons

So, for a test with French meringue you will need:

• almond flour 165 g;
• icing sugar 165 g;
• granulated sugar 150 g;
• dye, if desired, literally a pinch;
• egg white 115 g.

Cooking process:

1. Combine powder and flour. Pass through a fine sieve a couple of times. Please note that the indicated proportions are the amount of ingredients that should remain after all the manipulations. Therefore, it is better to sift the mixture directly onto the kitchen scale.
2. Beat the whites until stiff peaks. Start with the minimum speed setting of the mixer, gradually increasing the speed to the maximum. If you want to add a dye, then this should be done at the time of the formation of soft peaks. At the same time, carefully add sugar in a thin stream.
3. Extremely careful connect whipped whites and almond powder. Do not overdo it with stirring, it is important that the spatula drips off the spatula. It is important to stop exactly at the moment when the mass has already become uniform, but the proteins are still airy.
4. Transfer the mixture to a candy bag. Line a baking sheet with baking parchment.
5. Squeeze the dough onto the paper in neat circles, about 3 cm in size. The cookies should not be stirred too close to each other, leave 2 cm of free space.
6. After squeezing out the cream, the tip of the bag should be removed with a sharp, quick movement, as if cutting off. If the dough is cooked correctly, the characteristic “tail” will disappear by itself after a couple of seconds.
7. Take the baking sheet in your hands and hit the table vigorously several times. This is done to distribute the dough more evenly and to release excess air bubbles from it.
8. Now the dough should rest a little and wind down. It is this windy crust that will become crispy after baking and keep the tender dough inside.
9. After a quarter of an hour, touch the surface of the circle with your finger. If the dough is sticky, leave it alone for another 10-15 minutes.
10. Place the baking sheet on a hot plate at 180 degrees and bake for 14 minutes. The exact time depends on the power of your cooker.
11. After baking, the workpieces must cool, only after that they can be removed from the parchment. It is recommended to transfer the paper from the baking sheet.

The dough for macarons on the Italian meringue is prepared in a slightly different way. For this you need:

• sugar powder 300 g;
• almond flour 300 g;
• 2 times 110 g of egg white;
• pure water 75 ml;
• granulated sugar 2 servings - 50 and 250 g.

How to cook:

1. Loosen flour and powder with a sieve.
2. Add the first 110 g of protein. Stir.
3. Combine 250g sugar and water in a small saucepan. Place on stove. Cook to 120 degrees. In the absence of a thermometer, you can check the readiness of the syrup as follows - drop a little syrup on the connected thumb and forefinger. Spread your fingers apart, if the thread breaks, you still need to boil the syrup. If it immediately dried up and broke down, it was digested. Try melting in a water bath.
4. Whisk remaining whites and sugar until soft peaks.
5. Without turning off the mixer, pour in the syrup that has just been removed from the fire. The mixture will become decently bulky, then it will turn into a smooth and shiny one.
6. Combine the 2 obtained masses into one. You can interfere with confidence, the proteins will not fall off.
7. Repeat steps 4-11 from the recipe above.

To avoid burning the cookies, try placing the cookie sheet in a different, empty cookie sheet. During baking, do not open the oven door - this will ruin the dough sticking process and you will not get that very specific "skirt".

The cookies are ready, it remains only to apply the filling on 1 half with a pastry bag or syringe and cover the other half on top.