Adventures in Cooking - Macarons

I have been wanting to try baking macarons for aaaages, mostly because of all the ones I've tried from shops have been nice, but too sweet to enjoy completely. So I found this recipe on Taste and decided it seemed simple enough to try myself. I didn't photograph the process because I wasn't sure they would work, so I didn't want to photograph all of it only to not be able to post them in case the macarons ended up in the bin.

Anyway, I tried them and they worked! It's a miracle!

I was nervous because I've never really baked anything that involved vigorous egg white beating, but I took my time, followed the recipe and everything went smoothly!

They're not as pink as I would have liked, mostly because I didn't want to overdose the mixture with pink food colouring so I erred on the side of less is more, and the filling, though nice, felt like it could be a lot lighter (the white chocolate and cream is quite dense, although not too overwhelmingly sweet). I think the secret to getting macarons right is beating the egg whites until they really do form stiff peaks, and piping them onto the tray properly. Although I couldn't seem to get some of them not to have the little kick of the piping bag on top of them.

I also think I probably should have baked them on a lower temperature for about another five minutes, because they are crispy on the outside and soft on the inside as they should be, but they collapse a bit too easily once you bite into them (or hold them too firmly), but other than that they're really nice. Not too sweet, not too almond-y (I hate really, really almond-y flavoured things.

I'm quite pleased with my efforts!

I'd like to try using hazelnut meal next time and do a choc hazelnut macaron and photograph the process, so we'll see if I have time to do that before the bub arrives.

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