The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe. These Macarons are not to be confused with the American macaroons that have coconut. They are light airy fluffy and hard to master. To be honest I was down right nervous to make this recipe, to be sure that it would be a complete failure at my first attempt. That they would lay flat and have no rise or feet as they are called. I literally jumped up and down when I saw feet!! Though they were small feet, I was happy. Ultimately the taste of these were yummy, simply sweet paired with no other than a spiced pumpkin filling, perfect!
Please be sure to check out the other Daring Bakers here
Ingredients: Confectioners’ (Icing) sugar: 2 ¼ cups, Almond flour: 2 cups, Granulated sugar: 2 tablespoons, Egg whites: 5 (Have at room temperature)
First Measure out the ground almond meal and powdered sugar and mix well
Then in a mixer add your room temperature egg whites
and beat until soft peaks
then slowly add your sugar
and beat until stiff peaks
Then sift in your almond sugar mixture
add the orange zest
and fold until incorporating
and almost deflated looking
Then on parchment paper draw circle to help make even sized mac’s, and pipe out
they should settle out and become flat
Then bring your oven to 200 degrees and place in the oven for 5 minutes, to dry.
Then remove macarons and raise temp to 375 degrees and bake another 7-8 minutes
you should have feet, though mine are small
Then for the filling, I used about 1/2 cup pumpkin, 2 oz cream cheese, 1 T sugar, and sprinkle of cinnamon and cloves
Mix all ingredients together, and spread between mac’s!
and enjoy!
Macarons
recipe comes from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern. They have given me the most consistent results and so, for everyone’s delectation, I present to you an adaptation of Ms. Fleming’s recipe.
Ingredients
Confectioners’ (Icing) sugar: 2 ¼ cups (225 g, 8 oz.)
Almond flour: 2 cups (190 g, 6.7 oz.)
Granulated sugar: 2 tablespoons (25 g , .88 oz.)
Egg whites: 5 (Have at room temperature)Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 200°F (93°C). Combine the confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a medium bowl. If grinding your own nuts, combine nuts and a cup of confectioners’ sugar in the bowl of a food processor and grind until nuts are very fine and powdery.
2. Beat the egg whites in the clean dry bowl of a stand mixer until they hold soft peaks. Slowly add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture holds stiff peaks.
3. Sift a third of the almond flour mixture into the meringue and fold gently to combine. If you are planning on adding zest or other flavorings to the batter, now is the time. Sift in the remaining almond flour in two batches. Be gentle! Don’t overfold, but fully incorporate your ingredients.
4. Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a plain half-inch tip (Ateco #806). You can also use a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off. It’s easiest to fill your bag if you stand it up in a tall glass and fold the top down before spooning in the batter.
5. Pipe one-inch-sized (2.5 cm) mounds of batter onto baking sheets lined with nonstick liners (or parchment paper).
6. Bake the macaroon for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and raise the temperature to 375°F (190°C). Once the oven is up to temperature, put the pans back in the oven and bake for an additional 7 to 8 minutes, or lightly colored.
7. Cool on a rack before filling.