Macarons? Ah....

I haven't made macarons for a while.

Probably I have been used to "no need to be precise" attitude of baking, and my 40 year old oven - ah, it's as old as me if not older, I can't wait for my kitchen renovation to happen and my new ILVE oven to be up and running...

But at the meantime, I have to work with what I've got.

I have been collecting macaron recipes, and have been keen to try out some.   One of the books that I like is I love macarons by Japanese Pastry Chef Hisako Ogita.  I normally use the French Meringue method, I've got all the time on earth to age the egg whites anyway.

I don't think I've done a good job this time, considering I'm trying to do a red velvet macaron.  This is what I did on Saturday.

Anyway, this is how it goes:
3 egg whites
150g pure icing sugar
18g cocoa powder
several drops of red food colouring
65g fine white sugar
90g almond meal (the original recipe specified almond flour, maybe there's the slight difference)

The oven is definitely not correct as it's not cooking the cookies properly as according to the time specified, so I had to bake them for a bit longer, and some of them cracked a bit because the oven heat is not even.

Chocolate Butter Cream Filling:
100g 72% cocoa dark chocolate
4 tbsp icing sugar
175b butter - softened to room temperature
1 tbsp milk - plus extra if needed

It's a simple filling, bit more moist than butter cream using cocoa powder.
Melt chocolate (microwave, bain marie, whatever is handy), cool a little, but not to let set again.
Whisk butter with icing sugar till soft and well mixed. 
Add a little cooled chocolate and mix well.  Add milk as needed.

I must admit using bench top mixer is a lot quicker, however I was watching tele on Saturday night after the cookies were baked, and I decided to mix it with hand whisk whilst watching ....  Iron Chef.

It worked anyway, and helped to burn a few calories.

It's easy to store the macarons, in air tight containers in freezer, but I have other uses for those cookies....

To be continued....