Bubbles n Squeaks: Macarons with Raspberry & White Chocolate

Macarons are de riguer right now, as several cafes have sprung up around Melbourne specializing in the delicious melt-in-your-mouth French treats. The variety available now compared to 12 months ago here is astonishing: pistacho, passionfruit, snickers, lavender, violet and licorice are all flavours that have been devised. For cooks too, the macaron is a mountain to climb.

I won't go into much depth about the difficulties surrounding the making of macarons. The consistency of the batter, the numerous ways of whipping the egg whites, fables of leaving the oven door open, using powdered colors only. So many opinions, and rightly so: the macaron is a devilish food to make, and on this, my second attempt, i only got it partially right. Again, some of the shells did not come away from the baking paper. My macarons had little peaks from the piping bag which in truth should not be there. I will keep trying, and i urge you to do the same! For when you get it right, macarons are delicious and nothing comes close.

Ingredients (Makes about 25)

Macaron Shells

130gm pure icing sugar
110gm almond meal
65gm caster sugar
3-4 drops rose food coloring
100gm egg whites, left out overnight

Raspberry & White Chocolate filling

100gm white chocolate
1/4 cup thickened cream
1/2 cup raspberries, chopped

Method

Place the icing sugar and almond meal in a food processor and process until well mixed

Sift into a large mixing bowl and set aside

Place the egg whites into a mixing bowl and beat until soft peaks form

Continue to beat, adding a tablespoon of caster sugar at a time, until hard, glossy peaks form

Add the food colouring and beat until mixed through

Mix in half of the almond mixture, followed by the second half

*Note: Mix well, you want to knock most of the air out of the mixture to form a thick gooey consistency
The finaly consistency should very slowly creep down the side of the bowl

Transfer the macaron mixture to a piping bag
Pipe 5cm sized rounds onto lined baking tray

Leave the baking trays out for 30-60 minutes or until you can touch the top of the macaron without any mixture staying on your finger. A 'crust' should form
Preheat oven to 150 degrees
Place trays in oven for 10-12 minutes, swapping them around midway
Leave the macarons to cool completely on the tray

Carefully peel the macarons off the baking paper

Raspberry & White Chocolate Filling

Heat the cream in a small saucepan until just boiling and then remove from heat
Mix through the chopped chocolate until well combined then leave to sit for 10 minutes