{"id":36,"date":"2011-04-04T23:55:25","date_gmt":"2011-04-05T06:55:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/?p=36"},"modified":"2011-04-04T23:55:25","modified_gmt":"2011-04-05T06:55:25","slug":"coffee-macarons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/archives\/36","title":{"rendered":"Coffee Macarons"},"content":{"rendered":"

I never had a single macaron until a few years ago. I suppose they were never really big in the States until recently, so that’s probably why I had never seen the little sandwich cookies in bakeries while growing up. At first, I didn’t know what to expect. I mean, it’s just a couple of cookies with stuff sandwiched in between right?<\/p>\n

Well, it sort of is. But the shells are so airy while having this nice crunch, and an appropriately-chosen filling can really complement the flavor of the shells. I also love just seeing a rainbow of macarons in a display case.<\/p>\n

Sadly, I don’t have the baking skills to make professional-looking, uniform macarons. But I started trying to make them at home late last year, and I made another attempt for the bake sale last Saturday. Since the coffee macarons at Payard<\/a> were so delicious, I tried making some coffee ones again. The recipe I use is generally derived from this one<\/a> at Italian Food Forever, except I scaled it up a bit.<\/p>\n

The ingredients for the shells:
\n120 grams egg whites (that’s about 3.5 to 4 egg whites)
\n40 grams sugar
\n270 grams powdered sugar
\n150 grams almond flour (I get mine at Trader Joe’s)
\n1 tablespoon instant coffee<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3926\"<\/a>
\nI first whipped the egg whites and the sugar to a stiff peak.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3927\"<\/a>
\nThen I folded in the powdered sugar, almond flour, and instant coffee. You’re supposed to do this very gently, so that you don’t deflate the egg whites too much. I probably folded a bit too much this time, though…<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3928\"<\/a>
\nI use a large glass to stand the pastry bag up, so I can put the macaron batter in without needing an extra pair of hands. Nifty trick I learned on the internet.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3929\"<\/a>
\nThen I piped some circles onto some parchment paper. They spread out a bit, because I think the batter might have gotten too thin from me stirring too much. I also sprinkled some instant coffee onto the shells. I got that idea from this post<\/a> on Macaron Fetish.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3930\"<\/a>
\nAfter 9 minutes in the oven at 300F, they’re done. Mine always seem to crack, though. Baking them for 8-10 minutes seems to work best for me. I got that timing from this post<\/a> on Tartelette.<\/p>\n

The chocolate ganache filling is
\n1\/2 cup heavy cream
\n1 teaspoon instant coffee
\n3\/4 cup dark chocolate
\n3 tablespoons Nutella<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3916\"<\/a>
\nI chopped up the dark chocolate. I love eating dark chocolate chunks. But it’s hard to measure 3\/4 of a cup when it’s a bunch of chunks. I ended up using about 150 grams.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3919\"<\/a>
\nI brought the cream and the coffee up to almost a boil, and then turned the heat off.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3920\"<\/a>
\nI stirred in the dark chocolate and Nutella, and then it was done.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3931\"<\/a>
\nAfter letting the ganache cool, I put a spoonful between the macaron shells to make the sandwiches.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_3932\"<\/a>
\nThe macarons were a bit flat this time. And they cracked even more than usual. Probably overmixed. And the ganache didn’t spread very easily, probably because I let it chill too much.<\/p>\n

So they turned out OK, but not great. I wonder how the professionals manage to get them so perfect every time…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I never had a single macaron until a few years ago. I suppose they were never really big in the States until recently, so that’s probably why I had never seen the little sandwich cookies in bakeries while growing up. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[60,54],"class_list":["post-36","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baking","tag-coffee","tag-macarons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ryotakahashi.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}