Lavender-infused Vanilla Bean Macarons

  

(Recipe to come soon!)

Rose Water & Earl Grey Honey Macarons

  

I received this 4-pcs set of French dessert/pastries/macarons theme plates & a separate large serving plate by Rosanna in the mail today. I was so excited and couldn't wait to come home to put my macarons on there for some pictures. They are absolutely adorable! It was funny how I found out about these dessert plates from someone's blog and I immediately fell in love with them when I first saw them. I went to check where I could purchase them from and saw the original price O_O... after seeing the price I tried to forget about their existence for awhile. A week ago I randomly clicked on one of the daily sale emails that I signed up (I usually got them every morning but deleted them most of the time, I wasn't sure why this time I actually looked into it) and saw they had these plates on sale for a few days (and that was the last day too). I didn't even hesitate and I knew that this was probably meant to be. I ordered them and they arrived today. They are so cute and very well made. It is also not very common to see everyday products with dessert theme especially with macarons. I think I'm going to collect anything that's macaron related (if they are collectible & affordable) from now on :)

Now let's talk about my new flavor creation of this week. Earl Grey is not new anymore since I've done it a few times already and it's been a great favorite to the people who've tried them. My new challenge this time was to recreate the Rose water filling that resembles the one from Laduree's. The description that I received was -- Light, Fluffy, and Delicate -- Those were the main keywords that I tried to imagine the taste with. Since I wanted a lighter and less sweet buttercream this time, I looked into Italian Buttercream instead. It was my first time to try to make Italian Buttercream too. It actually wasn't as complicated as I thought it would be. The only part that was different from Swiss Meringue Buttercream is to boil the sugar syrup to a certain degree (just like the Italian way of making macarons) before mixing with meringue and butter. I added rose water flavoring at the end. The taste was very light, fluffy, and delicate! Someone I know that is a huge macaron fan who is also a huge fan of Laduree's Rose macaron tried it and told me that the taste brought him back to Paris. That was the best achievement and compliment I have received since I started my macaron making journey :)

For Rose Water Buttercream Filling:

Ingredients:

Butter 200g (7.1 oz)
Egg white 100g (3.5 oz)
Sugar 100g (3.5 oz)
Water 30 ml (about 30g)

Red food coloring

Rose Water 1 tsp (can adjust to your taste)

• Start beating the room temperature egg white with a hand mixer or a KitchenAid mixer.
• At the same time, pour sugar and water into a sauce pan and bring them to a boil.
• When the temperature of the syrup reaches 120C (248F), pour the syrup into the stiff egg white.
• Keep beating until the meringue cools down when touched by fingers.
• If you are using a handmixer, in a separate bowl, whip the room temperature butter cut in small cubes until it is light in color (almost white) and fluffy. If you are using a KitchenAid mixer,  switch the whisk wire attachment to the paddle attachment for beating butter. Adding small cubes of butter one at a time to the meringue.
• If you are using a handmixer, after beating the butter, combine it with the meringue and mix until they are smooth and fluffy. If you are using a KitchenAid mixer, just keep beating the buttercream with the paddle attachment until it is smooth and fluffy.
• Add about 1 tsp of Rose water flavoring and adjust the amount to your taste.
• Add a drop of red food coloring to create light pink color for the buttercream.

Enjoy this delicate and fluffy Rose water buttercream!

Annee

Raspberry Mascarpone & Hawaiian Plum (Li-Hing) Macarons

Kona Coffee & Raspberry Jam Macarons

Annee's Hawaiian Flavor Collection Macarons

Macaron Obsession!

I've been really obsessed with these little french cookies recently! I can't believe I've been experimenting with macaron baking for 7 nights straight after work. Spent several hours in the kitchen past midnight! I kept telling myself to rest but my curiosity kept pushing me to go for it. Luckily I haven't heard any complaint from my neighbors yet. The KitchenAid mixer is quite loud actually and the kitchen is right next to my apartment's door. I spent the time on the weekend looking for macaron pictures and blogs when I'm not baking them. I'm really crazy!

These are the instagram photos I took with my iPhone of the results from the last 3 nights.

The left side is Annee's Macaron, the right side is Laduree's Macaron that I received from someone (who is very talented! and pretty unexpected!) who is also a huge fan of macarons. I used French method and I still couldn't get the shiny surface like Laduree's. I suspected that they are not using French method like their recipe from Laduree Sucre Cookbook.

 This is from the following night using Italian meringue method since I want that shiny shells! The sugar syrup part was messed up and I thought the result would be disastrous. Who knew it actually didn't turn out as bad as I thought it would be (luckily I didn't decide to throw away the meringue but kept going on to finish the whole process).

Definitely need a better candy thermometer. Funny enough the next day I started to ask around for coworker's recommendation (a lot of serious bakers at the place I'm working at). I finally decided to go with this one. From what I heard it gives almost instant reading of the temperature, hopefully it will be worth it since it is not cheap for my budget.

Love the height and look of the ruffled feet on this one. Also love the shiny shell. I just don't know if I could produce this kind of look again for the next time. Need to keep experimenting.

This is the same batch of mixture from the Italian method one. Since I thought it was going to fail anyway, I decided to just pour the leftover mixture into a giant blob. Who would have though it actually worked! The ruffled feet also appeared on this giant shell and the inside texture is quite full! No hollow shell at all. This gotta be the biggest macaron shell I've ever seen in my life... and it happened in my kitchen :)

Annee

Fresh Strawberry Swiss Roll Cake

 

I had so many leftover egg yolks from making many batches of macarons recently (from both successful and failed batches). Found this recipe for making swiss roll cake which requires quite a lot of egg yolks and egg whites. It felt good that I could put these leftover eggyolks into use and didn't have to throw them away :) I love this swiss roll. The texture of the cake is very light and fluffy.

Hawaiian Sea Salt Caramel Macarons

Macaron shell Ingredients:

• Room-temperature egg whites 80g
• Granulated sugar 100g
• Almond powder 100g
• Powdered sugar 100g
• Chocolate brown + Lemon yellow gel food colors

Using French Meringue method.
Hawaiian Sea Salt Caramel Swiss Meringue Buttercream:

• Caramel sauce with Hawaiian sea salt
• Butter, 2 sticks
• Room-temperature egg whites, about 2 eggs
• Granulated sugar, about half cup
• Pinch of salt

To make the buttercream:

• Put room-temperature egg whites in the KitchenAid mixer bowl. Add all the granulated sugar to the egg whites. Heat a small sauce pan with water over high heat. Put the KitchenAid mixer bowl above the sauce pan to double boil. While the water is heating up, use a wire whisk to lightly whip the egg whites with sugar until combined. Keep whipping until the mixture is warm. Take small amount of the mixture and rub it between your fingers to test to see if the sugar is melted. Once all the sugar is melted, remove the KitchenAid bowl and put it back to the mixer. Attach the wire whisk to the KitchenAid and start beating on medium speed until the bowl is no longer hot. Increase the speed to high and keep beating until the meringue is firm and shiny.
• Once the meringue is done, remove the wire whisk from the KitchenAid and attach the paddle attachment. Put the KitchenAid on low speed. Cut the room-temperature butter sticks into smaller pieces. Slowly add the butter pieces one by one. After adding all the butter, increase the speed to medium high. The buttercream will start to curdle and it will look as if you're going to fail. Don't Panic :)
• Keep beating the buttercream on high speed. Listen carefully to the sound. After a few minutes, the buttercream should come together and looks smooth and creamy again.
• Now, start adding the caramel sauce and keep beating. Stop adding when you taste and like the flavor of the buttercream.
• Scrape the finished buttercream to a piping bag then squeeze it onto the cooled macaron shells :)

Lemon Honey Macarons

Lemon Macarons with Honey Swiss Meringue Buttercream!

Finally had a chance to take the making-of photos when I'm not the baker this time. Taking photos is as fun as baking macarons. I wish I could do both at the same time.

Matcha with Dark Chocolate Ganache Macarons

KitchenAid Speed = 6 for 7 minutes
Baked at 320F for 13-15 mins
Using French meringue method

First tray baked with Silpat Mat. Second tray baked with parchment paper. They produced different textures for the raised "feet". Silpat Mat seemed to distribute heat more evenly than the parchment paper as macarons' feet all raised at the same time. However, the raised feet seemed to be shorter with Silpat Mat.

Macaronage might be a little bit over mixed this time as the raised feet are shorter than the previous experiment. Meringue was beaten a little longer than the Blood Orange batch which produced shinier surface.

Blood Orange Macaron Shells

❤ Blood Orange Macarons

KitchenAid Speed = 6 for 5:30 mins.
Baked at 160C (320F) for 15-20 mins.




Sprinkled Blood Orange peel on wet meringue surface... Not a good idea...as you can see in the above pictures. The ones with orange peel have cracked surface after being baked. These shells also turned out to be hollow. My theory for this phenomenon is the cracked surface allowed air to penetrate faster, so when the shells cooled down outside of the oven, the temperature dropped too fast and caused the inside to deflate.


However, the shells without blood orange peel on top came out pretty well. I was curious so I cut the cooled shell apart to see. The body came out full and not hollow. There are a few air bubbles but that should be fine since it needs to rest and become moist after leaving in the fridge for 24 hours.

My conclusion for today is do not beat the meringue too dry. Once it reaches a firm peak (I'll try to post a picture later) it is good to stop the beating. Fold the dry ingredients with meringue until you get a runny paste (but not overly runny) that would flow like thin lava and form a ribbon pile that would disappear after a few seconds. Another very important factor is the temperature. I think it is totally worth it to buy an oven thermometer to test the temperature of the oven. I found out that when the pre-heat was done for my oven which was set to 320F, the oven thermometer showed 250F instead. It took about 20 more minutes for it to reach the set temperature. It also fluctuated sometimes so it is a good idea to keep an eye on the oven thermometer. Every oven is different so get to know your oven :) Be nice to her and she will produce you nice macaron shells!

Bonne Chance!