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For the 6 months I have been suffering from an obsession with macarons. And particularly an obsession with getting the perfect macarons. In my last post I had to cunningly (or perhaps not so cunningly :p) disguise the fact that the macaron shells were not perfectly smooth, but this time I was delighted that there was no need.
Ingredients:
350g icing sugar
250g ground almonds
215g egg whites
150g caster sugar
Half teaspoon gel food colouring of your choice
Method:
Preheat the oven to 160c.
- Whisk the egg whites until semi whipped, add 150g caster sugar and the food colouring. Whisk until you have a stiff and glossy meringue mixture.
- Place the icing sugar and the almond powder in a blender. Blitz and then sieve this mixture into a bowl to ensure that you have a very fine, lump-free powder.
- Incorporate the dry ingredients and the food colouring into the meringue mixture. Use a spatula to cut and fold the mixture until is smooth, shiny and ribbon-like.
- Fill a piping bag with the macaron mix and pipe the macarons onto a lined baking tray. Leave the macarons to dry for at least 20mins at room temperature and then bake in the preheated oven for 10-15mins.
- Once cooled remove the shells from the baking paper and pipe filling onto half of the shells before topping with another shell.
For the lemon and white chocolate filling:
140g butter
120g icing sugar
100g melted white chocolate
A squeeze of lemon juice
- Cream the butter and then mix in the icing sugar.
- Add the white chocolate and the lemon juice to taste.
- Mix well.
