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French Macarons

French Macarons

A French Cookie that looks stunning and tastes even better.
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Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Servings: 10
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: French
Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients
  

For the Cookies
  • 78 grams Almond Flour
  • 87 grams Powdered Sugar
  • 62 grams egg whites
  • 1/8 tsp Cream of Tartar
  • 1 pinch Salt
  • 52 grams Granulated Sugar
  • 1/3 tsp Rose/Lavender Extract
  • Gel food Color A few swatches
For the Filling:
  • 3 ounces Cream Cheese At Room Temperature
  • 2 tbsp Butter At Room Temperature
  • 1/2 cup Powdered Sugar
  • 1/2 tsp Rose/Lavendar Extract
  • Gold Sugar/Edible Gold Dust For Garnish

Method
 

For the Cookies
  1. Pulse the almond flour in a food processor a few times.
  2. Add the powdered sugar to it and sift it. My mom asked me to sift this mixture at least a couple of times. Three times would be better. Discard whatever you sift out.
  3. Separate the egg whites from the egg yolk. Be very careful not to have the egg yolk break into the whites.
  4. Now in the bowl of a stand mixer, add the egg whites and the cream of tartar at medium speed.
  5. As you see the egg whites getting foamy, add the granulated sugar in 2-3 batches. Increase the speed, and let it whip.
  6. The egg white should be whipped to a stiff consistency. Easily took me about 6-8 mins for the whole process. You have to stop the mixer and check if the egg whites when scooped gets stiff peaks.
  7. Add the rose OR lavender extract (I made two types as you can see and use one for each) and the food color. I used pink for the Rose ones and purple for the lavender ones. Give it one more mix for a second and remove.
  8. Add the almond flour and powdered sugar mix into the egg whipped egg whites in 2-3 batches and mix it in. It took me 3-4 mins to mix and get a texture which would let me write an eight with the batter falling freely from the spatula used for mixing.
  9. Now fill a piping bag with a round tip and pour the batter in it.
  10. Prepare couple of cookie sheets with parchment paper. I did not use a macaron template but I strongly advise using one. The shapes of my macarons were not uniform for sure especially the lavender ones as you can see.
  11. Pipe small circles about an inch and half in diameter about a couple of inches apart from each other on the cookie sheet.
  12. You should put gentle pressure on the piping bag and let the batter fill out from the center and form a circle.
  13. Once you are done piping the circles, tap and gently bang the cookie sheets on your countertop for 2-3 times. This actually helps reveal the air bubbles. With a tooth pick burst the bubbles gently and remove them.
  14. Now let the cookie sheet rest on the counter top for at least 20-30 mins.
  15. The macarons should dry up enough so that when touched they feel dry and nothing sticks to your fingers.
    Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F.
  16. Put the cookie sheets in the middle rack and bake for 20 mins. Take them out and let them stand for 10 mins. Remove on to a wired cookie rack and let them cool down.
  17. In the meantime, whip together all the ingredients for the filling and fill a piping bag with a round tip again.
  18. Take the cookies and fill one side with the filling and place another cookie gently on top to sandwich them.
  19. To decorate them, for the lavender cookies I had put some golden sugar on them just before I put them in the oven to bake them.
  20. For the gold macarons, I used ΒΌ tsp edible gold dust and mixed it with sugar syrup and painted on the macarons.

Notes

Here is the advice that Mom gave me:
  1. Make sure the eggs, cream cheese, and butter (the latter two for the filling) are at room temperature.
  2. Sift the almond powder and powdered sugar at least a couple of times.
  3. Make sure the bowl of the stand mixer is absolutely clean and there are no traces of anything in it. Wash and wipe it before adding the egg whites.
  4. Use gel food color preferably and use enough to get a deeper color. On baking the color usually fades a little.
  5. Do not go overboard with the filling.
  6. I used rose and lavender extract because we had them at home. But the most basic flavor to try and get started would be vanilla extract which probably you have in your pantry.