Macaroon

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

1. Freeze the almond meal to prevent oil from clumping the meal.
2. Blend the almond meal with icing sugar in a food processor to aerate and remove lumps.
3. 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.
   
4. Fold in the almond and icing mixture. The consistency resembles sloppy mash potatoes.
5. 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.
6. Fold in flavouring.
7. Fill a piping bag fitted with a plain piping tube, or use a folded greaseproof paper cone with the tip cut off.
   
8. 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.
9. Transfer the piped sheets to paper lined baking trays.
10. Knock the trays to remove air and to aid smoothing.
11. Rest 30 minutes to 2 hours for sugar crusts to form.
12. 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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Malaysia: How to Weave Ketupat Basket for Satay Rice

A lovely palm leaf basket for cooking and serving satay rice. To make your own, follow the pictures below. Click to enlarge the thumbnails. Expert video instructions can be found here.




Twirl 1-metre strips of palm leaves around the left and right hands to give 3 loops on each hand. The head of the palm leaf refers to the stem end, while the tail refers to the tapering leaf end.

Weave right hand loops (green) over left hand loops (yellow) using the following pictures as a guide.




For the first row (bottom of basket), pass right hand loop INTO the left hand loop, OUT over the top of centre loop on left hand, and INTO the last loop on the left hand.




For the second row (middle of basket), pass the middle right hand loop OUT over the top of the left hand loop, INTO the centre loop on the left hand and OUT over the top of the last loop on the left hand.




For the third row (top of basket), pass right hand loop INTO the left hand loop, OUT over the top of centre loop on left hand, and INTO the last loop on the left hand. That is, same as for the first row.




After weaving the right hand loops across the left hand loops, tighten and adjust the basket.




Turn over the basket from top to bottom so that the tails are on the top right. Variation for ketupat bawang, the onion-shaped version, is included at the end. Continue here to make the diamond-shaped ketupat basket.




Weave the horizontal tail (yellow) across the top and down the left side of the basket.




Weave the head (green), on the top left, across the top of the basket.




Flip over and rotate around so that the tail (green), which started on the left hand, is horizontal and to the top right.




Weave the tail (green) across the top and down the left side of the basket to meet up with the other tail (yellow), at the bottom left.




Weave the head (yellow), on the top left, across the top of the basket so that the two heads meet at the top right.




Tighten the heads and tails to complete the basket. To fill with rice, open a mouth at the corner where the heads meet. After filling to 3/4 full, pull the tails to close the mouth. Tie the heads or weave into the basket to seal. Tie the tails to secure.




For ketupat bawang, the onion-shaped version, vary the steps after weaving loops from right hand across to left hand and turning the basket over with the tails to the top right.

Instead of weaving the horizontal tail (yellow), weave the vertical tail (green) across the top and down the left side.

Flip and rotate the basket around so that the remaining tail (yellow) is vertical and to the top right. Weave the tail (yellow) across the top and down the left side to meet up with the other tail (green).

Rotate the basket so that the heads are vertical and the tails hang down. Weave each head across the top to meet in the middle. When completed the heads form the base of the onion. Tighten and adjust.

There you have it, ketupat baskets to impress diners. It takes 3 hours, depending on size, to cook ketupat rice in boiling water.

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