Spring: craving pastel colors and… macarons!
Today I propose a classic from Ladurèe: raspberry macarons. These macarons have a filling based on a raspberry compote that is made the day before. They are very fresh and pleasant and are perfect for spring and summer.
Ingredients for the macarons (for about 40 macarons of 3.5 cm in diameter)
50 g of almond flour (buy the flour directly, choose a very fine one)
150 g of icing sugar
110 g of 2-day-old egg whites at room temperature
15 g of granulated sugar
yellow gel food coloring, a spoon tip (optional, you can also leave them white)
a very fine mesh sieve and a kitchen thermometer for the sugar
For the sugar syrup (Italian Meringue):
150 g of granulated sugar
50 ml of water
Raspberry jam (the amount is abundant, put the leftovers in a jar and use it for breakfast)
375 g of well-cleaned fresh raspberries
225 g of granulated sugar
2 teaspoons of pectin (fruttapec 2:1)
the juice of half a lemon
BEFORE YOU START
1 – Bake the flour of almonds in the oven for 10 minutes at 150°C and let it cool before combining it with the icing sugar.
Pour the TPT (tant pour tant = equal weight of sugar and dried fruit flour) in several batches into a mixer and turn it on at maximum speed for 5 seconds. Sift everything carefully using a very fine mesh sieve and eliminate the larger granules.
2 – prepare the baking trays by placing sheets of baking paper on the bottom with the dimensions of the macaron shapes you want to make printed on them (3.5 cm in diameter) well spaced apart. You can draw the circles directly on the paper with a dark and very evident color and then position the sheet with the drawn part in contact with the baking tray, you will be able to see your drawings from the other side. This allows you to make them all the same and to have them all regular obtaining a good result both in cooking and when decorating.
RASPBERRY JAM (to be prepared the day before):
Mix the sugar with the pectin.
Wash the raspberries well and put them in a pan and blend them with the minipimer (immersion blender). Let it cool and add the sugar and pectin mixture and the lemon juice and mix. Return to the heat on low heat and bring to the boil. Boil for 3 minutes and remove from the heat. Let it cool and put in a piping bag to cool for at least one night.
METHOD
Sift the almond flour with the icing sugar. Pour the granulated sugar into a saucepan and add the water and on low heat bring the temperature to 118°C.
Meanwhile, put 55 g of egg whites in a bowl and lightly whip them, gradually adding the 15 g of granulated sugar. When the syrup is ready and has reached 118°C, reduce the speed of the appliance in which you are whipping the egg whites and pour it in slowly little by little (when you pour the syrup, either let it drip onto the edge of the mixer or stop the appliance, pour in a little bit and whip a little, add more slowly, whip and so on). Whip until you have a firm and shiny meringue but with a bec d’oiseau shape (eagle’s beak: it is called this when when you lift the whisk it is so compact that it forms like eagle’s beaks).
Then add the 55 g of unwhipped egg whites kept aside and continue processing until they are well combined. When the temperature reaches 40°C, add the food coloring and give a very brief stir. At this point replace the wire whisk with the kappa (leaf) whisk.
Pour in the sifted almond flour and icing sugar mixture all at once and mix at low speed, continuously checking that a smooth but firm ribbon of dough forms.
Line cookie sheets with baking paper using cookie cutters. Place a little dough in the corners of the sheets so that the paper adheres perfectly and you get regular shapes. Pour the dough into a piping bag with a smooth nozzle (size 11) and create little dough buttons, spacing them out as the macaron tends to become a little flat during baking.
Let it rest for about 15-20 minutes (possibly flattening with a wet finger any “tips” that have formed while creating the macaron with the piping bag): this step is called croutage, and if you are in a hurry you can also skip it.
In the video below we explain how to flatten the tips of the macarons.
Turn the oven on to 145°C, checking the temperature with a thermometer, and bake the pan for about 12-15 minutes, checking constantly. The macarons will rise a little and a collar will form at the base.
Take them out of the oven, remove the macaron sheet and place it on a shelf until completely cooled.
Detach the sweets and use your index finger to make a small depression in the middle to allow the filling to settle optimally. Fill them with a small amount of jam placed in the center, and place the other biscuit on top, rotating it slightly (the filling should not overflow from the two biscuit halves).
To store them, put them in the refrigerator wrapped in cling film, take them out 10 minutes before serving and they will be perfect. You can also freeze them (always wrapped in cling film) and then transfer them to the refrigerator.
And now enjoy them, hurray for Marcarons! And thanks to Marie Antoinette for having loved them so much that they have survived to this day!
Editor’s note (or rather, from Nicolò, Angelica’s boyfriend). The harsh and often censored truth about macarons: macarons don’t always come out right, maybe it’s the humidity, maybe you let them rest too little, maybe your oven, maybe it’s a particularly unlucky day. I’ve rarely seen Angelica as disconsolate as I saw her in front of the cracked macarons.
It’s not your fault, it’s the macarons that are infamous. But don’t give up. In the end they’ll come out right, and you’ll ask yourself about the ones that come out right now “but why did they crack if I made them in exactly the same way?!
