Nothing beats the mystique of the delicate almond flavoured macaroon whose history spans some 4 centuries, from monastic origins to haute Parisian tea parties, and war time interludes. The romance of these meringue cookies that marries a crisp crust and a soft chewy interior goes as far back as 1533 (The Food Chronology by James Trager). Read the history of Italian and French connections.
Traditional macaroons are like the Italian amaretti without the bitter-sweet amaretto almond liqueur. These macaroons are baked on edible rice paper. The rice paper is trimmed around the cookie after cooking.
Rice paper is used before the invention of silicone baking parchment. Some of the older folks probably remember the recycled brown paper shopping bags which require steaming over a hot wet tea towel to remove the cookies.
Coconut kisses are many a grandma's x-rated version of the macaroon.
The French spelling is macaron. Pedantic French patissiers refine the cookies, giving them ruffled petticoats or skirts, and smooth shiny, dome sugar crusts, by air drying while resting the uncooked cookies. Haute restaurants serve these intimate French rendition, sandwiched with ganache, buttercream or jam in many combinations of colours and flavours.
Part of the fun making macaroons is to find the perfect matching pair to join together. Grandma's generation bakes slap dash "kisses" without fuss. It takes time to master the intricacies of the macaroon, to create that perfect union in the French style.
Ingredients
60 g icing sugar (3 tablespoons)
40 g almond meal (1/3 c or 1/4 c + 1 tablespoon ground rice/cornstarch/cocoa)
40 g egg white (from 1 x 67 g egg)
30 g castor sugar (1.5 tablespoons)
1 teaspoon water or reserved egg white, optional
2 drops almond essence, optional
Method
- Freeze the almond meal to prevent oil from clumping the meal.
- Blend the almond meal with icing sugar in a food processor to aerate and remove lumps.
- Whisk the egg white and castor sugar over a basin of freshly boiled water until stiff and glossy, but not dry. This takes 2-5 minutes. Do not cook the egg white.
- Fold in the almond and icing mixture. The consistency resembles sloppy mash potatoes.
- If prefer, adjust with water or reserved egg white to a flowing consistency for a smoother finish. Trails disappear back into the mixture after a few seconds.
- Fold in flavouring.
- Fill a piping bag fitted with a plain piping tube, or use a folded greaseproof paper cone with the tip cut off.
- Pipe 2-3 cm rounds on silicon baking parchment or rice paper. Space about 2 cm apart for spreading. Use a tooth pick to adjust the shapes. If wanted, smooth the surfaces with the back of a wet spoon.
- Transfer the piped sheets to paper lined baking trays.
- Knock the trays to remove air and to aid smoothing.
- Rest 30 minutes to 2 hours for sugar crusts to form.
- Bake at 130 degrees Celsius for 12 minutes, without browning, until firm to touch.
Notes
One large egg white (40 g) makes about 72 cookies or 36 sandwiched macaroons with a diameter around 2 cm. For 3 cm diameter, the number of cookies is around 40, or 20 sandwiched pairs.
Instead of almond, use other nuts, seeds, crushed biscuits or coconut. Toast the seeds in a cast iron pan or roast the nuts in an oven at 200 degrees Celsius for 5 minutes. Freeze before milling to prevent clumping and/or oily butter from forming.
For icing sugar, mill granulated sugar to powder in a spice mill. For castor sugar mill granulated sugar in short bursts until the required texture.
Age the egg white at room temperature for at least 1/2 hour before, or overnight for a better consistency of batter.
For browning, cook at 160 degrees Celsius.
Cracks often develop for shorter resting time. Traditional macaroons are not rested. For the characteristic skirts (also called feet) on the French versions, rest for 2-5 hours for the sugar crust to form. Some patissiers dust the raw cookies with icing. Depending on humidity, resting times can be longer or shorter.
To flatten and even out the piped cookies, slap the silicon baking parchment on the kitchen bench before transferring to a baking tray.
To prevent the bottom from browning and reduce cracks, put 3 sheets of printing paper under the silicon baking parchment.
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