Black matte EVA platter. Available on our webshop or at www.etsy.com/shop/MaiaMingDesigns
I adore macarons...these delightful, little, bite-sized French cookies that come in so many flavors. Only recently did I try to make them, and they were SO DIFFICULT TO MAKE!!! Suddenly I understood why bakeries are selling macarons at such outrageous prices.
When I bake, I like to make things that I can't buy in shops. So when I explored macaron recipes, I tried to make Matcha green tea macarons, Sesame seed-chocolate macarons, and other unusual flavor combinations. Maybe it was my casual attitude towards baking, maybe it is the temperature of my oven, maybe I tried to make macarons on humid, wet days, but in any event, my first macaron efforts were disappointing...too flat, too chewy, not very macaron-ish macarons.
I invested in a macaron mat. I tried both the French way and the Italian way of making macarons. I watched a video on Martha Stewart. Making macarons is challenging, but I am getting the hang of it. These Hazelnut-Nutella macarons are amazing, and decidedly my most successful macaron batch to date. The recipe below is basically adapted from the same recipe as Martha's Chocolate Macarons with Toasted Hazelnuts Recipe, with a few essential points emphasized.
(http://www.marthastewart.com/1054194/toasted-hazelnut-and-chocolate-macarons 2/2)
Hazelnut-Nutella Macarons:
INGREDIENTS
2/3 cup toasted skinned hazelnuts
1 cup confectioners' sugar (117 grams)
2 large egg whites, room temperature
1/4 cup granulated sugar (53 grams)
FILLING
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 1/2 ounces finely chopped bittersweet chocolate
1/2 tablespoon unsalted butter
3 tablespoons store-bought chocolate-hazelnut spread (Nutella or equivalent substitute)
DIRECTIONS
1. Place hazelnuts in a food processor; process until as fine as possible.
(I used our coffee grinder and found making hazelnut flour was quite difficult, because hazelnuts are oily and make a bit of a paste, even when they are well toasted. I would recommend chopping the hazelnuts before toasting them and then toasting the ground hazelnuts a little after grinding them.)
Add confectioners' sugar; process until combined, about 1 minute.
2. Pass hazelnut mixture through a fine-mesh sieve.
(I think I am going to invest in a good quality sifter because my sieve got clogged a few times)
3. Whisk egg whites and granulated sugar while the egg whites are still clear.
4. Beat the egg whites into stiff, glossy peaks.
5. Add dry ingredients all at once. Fold with a spatula from bottom of bowl upward, then press flat side of spatula firmly through middle of mixture.
(This process is called "macaronage" and reduces air bubbles in the batter.)
Repeat just until batter is glossy and flows.
6. Rest a pastry bag inside a vertical cylinder to transfer the batter into the bag, then close the
top. Cut a small hole in the bottom tip of the pastry bag.
(You don't want the batter to come out too quickly, I cut my hole to less than 1 cm in diameter.)
7. Either onto a parchment sheet or a macaron mat, pipe batter into 3/4-inch round cookies.
(A macaron mat helps to make the cookies uniformly round and the same size, I also found the raised rims helpful to contain the batter from spreading out on the sheets)
*Important! Let the macaron sheets sit for 30-40 minutes to dry and create a slight crust on the surface. Tap sheets firmly against counter 2 or 3 times to release air bubbles.
8. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
(My oven is Cº and this corresponds to 177ºC. All my previous recipes said to bake macarons at 150-160º centigrade, which was not high enough!)
9. Bake macarons for 13-15 minutes.
(Martha says 13 minutes, mine were undercooked at 13 and took a couple of minutes extra)
10. Filling: Heat heavy cream in a saucepan until bubbles begin to form. Add chocolate and butter; stir to
combine. Stir in chocolate-hazelnut spread. Refrigerate until thick and spreadable.
11. Only bake 1 sheet at a time.
My macaron mat holds 48 round halves, which makes 24 sandwiched macarons.
Use a spatula to spread filling on flat sides of half of cookies and then top with remaining half.
Store macarons in the refrigerator in a closed storage tin.
Black matte EVA platter. Available on our webshop or at www.etsy.com/shop/MaiaMingDesigns
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