Tutorial and Recipe: Macarons

So, let's get this straight right up front: Macaroons ("Mah-kah-ROONS") are homey, chewy coconut cookies containing condensed milk, and French macarons ("Mah-kah-RAWN" - the "s" is silent) are light, delicate meringue cookies sandwiched together with a luscious filling. 

I try not to be a Judgy McJudgypants when people mispronounce words, even though it hurts my heart to hear my beloved English language butchered...or in this case, French (but I digress); however, I would greatly prefer that the appropriate name is used in this particular case.  And no, you're not paranoid; all professional bakers WILL judge you.

Macarons are, admittedly, one of the most challenging patisseries for a baker to attempt. So many factors need to be controlled for a successful outcome, and many times the recipe will fail if even one of the main elements is a little out of whack; sometimes, your macarons recipe will fail because the moon is in the seventh house and Jupiter is aligning with Mars, or you frowned at the batter for too long. Or mispronounced "macaron".  Who knows.

The best thing to remember when attempting this massively finicky cookie, is that the most important, controllable elements to get right are humidity, freshness of ingredients, oven temperature, timing, proper kitchen equipment, and a light, steady hand.

 

The first time I ever made macarons was in Pastry school; the class was taught to make four different flavours (2 per team), which we then boxed up, three of each, and the school sold them as holiday treats (we were not allowed to keep our production, although we could buy what we made for a seriously reduced price). 

I've been fascinated by what makes macarons so special ever since.

The anatomy of a macaron is simple; you have two biscuit bases, with a luscious filling sandwiched between them. The perfect macaron is solid (no cavity of air within), has a "pied", or "foot" that happens during baking, and is smooth on the top surface, with no wrinkles, cracks, or gritty bumps. Perfect macarons only occur when all of the above criteria are met (temperature, timing, etc.); in other words, there is little to no leeway, wiggle room, or forgiveness when making these challenging little cookies!

I decided to lose my mind make these for my wedding dessert table, because, hey, I'm a pastry chef; I'm *sure* I have the time/skill/motivation to do them perfectly on the first try!

...hehheh...hubris is funny.

So yeah...of the several dozen macarons I made (in three different flavour combinations, no less, because I am apparently insane...), maybe half turned out at the very least halfway acceptable to my perfectionist mind. Frustrating.  I was battling against some of the hard limits that Macarons impose upon their creators, namely time (I was rushing things at certain points), temperature (trying to make the perfect macaron during an August heatwave is dumb dumb DUMB), and killer humidity (see previous).

One more obstacle I didn't foresee: all of my desserts were being made to be boxed up and delivered  to the venue on the day prior to the wedding, as the kitchen crew would be completing and displaying my work on the day of, me being busy getting married and all.  Fine and well if one of the kitchen crew happens to be a pastry chef, and knows how to store/handle items as delicate as macarons, which in this case, they did not.  I blame myself for that one; I should have left more specific instructions on how delicate they were.  I'm sure many of my creations suffered from rough handling in the 24 hours prior to the wedding, sometime between storage, un-boxing, and display, given that the best picture I can find does not show my poor wee babies in their best light...

So ...much...damage...wahhh!!

I made pink rose flavoured ones with raspberry preserves filling, orange flavoured orange ones with milk chocolate buttercream filling, and (what were supposed to be blue, haha) green marshmallow flavoured ones with blueberry nutmeg preserves filling.

Anyway, here is a perfect recipe for basic macarons; this recipe works very well, given that you follow all of its steps in the proper order. Good luck!

Basic Macarons

Yield: 80-100 1" round halves (40-50 sandwiches)

• 225 grams icing sugar
• 125 grams ground almonds
• 110 grams egg whites (about 4), aged overnight at room temperature
• 30 grams granulated sugar
• Pinch of salt

Step 1: Size and print out four pages of 1" radius circles about 2" apart (template included at bottom of this post for your convenience); place each sheet on a doubled baking sheet and completely cover with a flat piece of parchment paper; set aside. Note: if you're skilled with piping and don't need a "cheat sheet", skip this step and just use the blank parchment paper or a Silpat, you Fancy Jack, you.

Step 2: Push almond flour (also called almond meal) through a fine sieve into a medium-sized bowl, and sift icing sugar on top. Mix together and set aside.
(Tip: at this point, I ran the icing sugar/almond flour through the food processor for about a minute for a fine grind. This helps lessen/eliminate lumps and the grittiness of the almond flour in the final product).

Step 3: In a large clean, dry mixing bowl, whip the room temperature egg whites with the pinch of salt on medium speed until foamy. Increase the speed to high and gradually add granulated sugar as they whip. Continue to whip to stiff peaks—the whites should be firm and shiny.

Step 4: With a flexible spatula, gently fold in icing sugar/almond flour mixture into egg whites until completely incorporated. The mixture should be shiny and "flow like magma" (when small peaks dissolve to a flat surface, that's your clue to stop mixing).

This is the time to add any flavourings or colourings you want for your macarons. I highly recommend using candy oils and food colour paste or gel because they are highly concentrated and will not dilute your batter adversely.

Step 5: Fit a piping bag with a 3/8" round tip. Gently pipe the batter onto the baking sheets, within the circles. It's best to work from the back to the front so you don't accidentally drag through your hard work! Gently but firmly tap the underside of the baking sheet to remove air bubbles. Let dry at room temperature for 1 to 2 hours to allow skins to form (important to achieving a smooth, unwrinkled surface during baking).

Step 6: Bake in a 325 degreeF oven for 10 to 11 minutes. Make sure you have double-panned your baking pans to protect your delicate macarons from burning. Use a wooden spoon to keep the oven door slightly ajar, and carefully rotate the baking sheet after 5 minutes for even baking.

Step 7: Remove macarons from oven and transfer the parchment to a cooling rack. When cool, slide a metal offset spatula or paring knife underneath the macaron to remove from parchment. If they are stubbornly resisting being removed, you can carefully pour a small amount of boiling water underneath the parchment paper to help "steam" them off the paper (put the parchment back on your baking pan first!).

Step 8: Pair cooled macarons of similar size, and pipe about 1/2 tsp of the filling of your choice onto one of the pair. Sandwich macarons together gently but evenly and firmly, and refrigerate to allow flavours to blend together. Bring back to room temperature before serving.

Have fun with your flavour pairings!  There are virtually unlimited possibilities, so go as wild as you can stand.  I'm always up for pictures and reviews of your own recipe success (and failures!), so please feel free to send me a comment with pics if possible.  Good luck!

Tutorial and Recipe: Raspberry Jam

The second jam I wanted to make after the "kinda blue" blueberry-nutmeg jam was a nice, deep red, to reflect the red in my wedding colours.  I looked around for other recipes, but I really had my heart set on the gorgeous, jewel-like colours of raspberry jam. Having made it before, I knew how to make it, how easy it would be, and what to expect.

I had originally hoped to recreate a Raspberry-Chambord jam my classmates and I made in Year 2 of Pastry School, but I was unsuccessful in finding the proper raspberry liqueur, so I left it out and let the razzies I had picked myself and frozen at the peak of their ripeness do the talkin'!

Please excuse the shoddy jam labels; totally my fault.  My Photoshop-talented bridesmaid, Katrina, had made some amazeballs labels for all three of the jams, but because I couldn't decide on my "yellow" jam until it was too late to order the labels, I had to make do with my own unprofessional-looking, hand-printed labels.  However, since this *is* my blog, I am giving these labels another chance at celebrity, so all can see her awesomeness!

This is the label she created for me for the raspberry jam:

Awwwriiiight!

So anyway, here is the recipe and the tutorial for making this delicious jam!

Raspberry Jam 

Original Source: Bernardin online 

Makes about 6 x 250 ml jars 

• 4 cups (1000 ml) raspberries, fresh, or frozen and completely thawed
• 1 pouch (85 ml) Liquid Pectin
• 6 -1/2 cups (1625 ml) granulated sugar

Place 6 clean 250 ml mason jars on a rack in a boiling water canner; cover jars with water and heat to a simmer (180°F/82°C). Set screw bands aside. Heat sealing discs in hot water, not boiling (180°F/82°C). Keep jars and sealing discs hot until ready to use.

Push about half of the raspberries through a sieve (not a colander) to separate from the seeds; capture as much of the pulp as you can; discard the seeds. Recombine with unseeded raspberries. If you prefer a totally unseeded jam, you can de-seed the entire amount of raspberries; if you are doing do, I'd add another cup of raspberries to the total, to make up for volume lost through de-seeding.

In a large, deep stainless steel saucepan, stir together prepared fruit and all of the sugar. Over high heat, bring mixture to a full rolling boil that cannot be stirred down. Add liquid pectin, squeezing entire contents from pouch. Return to boil; boil hard 1 minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and skim off foam.

Ladle hot jam into a hot jar to within 1/4 inch (0.5 cm) of top of jar (headspace). Using nonmetallic utensil, remove air bubbles and adjust headspace, if required, by adding more jam. Wipe jar rim removing any food residue. Centre hot sealing disc on clean jar rim. Screw band down until resistance is met, then increase to fingertip tight. Return filled jar to rack in canner. Repeat for remaining jam.

 

 

When canner is filled, ensure that all jars are covered by at least one inch (2.5 cm) of water. Cover canner and bring water to full rolling boil before starting to count processing time. At altitudes up to 1000 ft (305 m), process (i.e. boil filled jars) for 10 minutes.

When processing time is complete, turn stove off, remove canner lid, wait 5 minutes, then remove jars without tilting and place them upright on a protected work surface. Cool upright, undisturbed 24 hours; DO NOT RETIGHTEN screw bands.

After cooling check jar seals. Sealed discs curve downward and do not move when pressed. Remove screw bands; wipe and dry bands and jars. Store screw bands separately or replace loosely on jars, as desired. Label and store jars in a cool, dark place. For best quality, use home canned foods within one year.

Tutorial and Recipe: Blueberry Nutmeg Jam

Being a baker as well as a full-time administrative professional can lead to certain...expectations on the part of friends and family at times.  This was in evidence at my wedding, too!  I just *knew* that if I didn't make my own cake and do the dessert table myself, my guests would be asking why I didn't provide the desserts, considering it's not only what I do for a living, but my passion?

Well, that's what I imagined they would say, anyway...

The same thing applied to my choice of wedding favours as well. My three reasons: 1) I wanted to make something that would not only be appreciated at the moment of the giving, but later on, after the wedding was but a distant memory; 2) It was important to me to not just give out some cheap little piece of bric a brac that would be shoved in a cabinet and forgotten about, donated, thrown away, or broken within a few short months, and 3) I wanted to share my love of and skill in baking and desserts with the people I loved the most!

So, what is a gift that satisfies these criteria?  Food, of course! To that end, I decided on making three delicious homemade jams, with the jam colours consistent with my wedding colours -- or at least as close an approximation as I could get. I processed them in cute little 125 mL jars, and let guests choose which jams -- and how many -- they would like to take home with them.

This tutorial and recipe is for the Blueberry Nutmeg Jam one of my amazing bridesmaids and I made in the month leading up to my August wedding:

Blueberry Nutmeg Jam

Step 1: Prepare your workspace. From left to right you see screw-bands (for holding the lid inserts on the jars), a head-space gauge (the blue stick), a jar lifter, jars, and a canning funnel (not pictured, inserts and lid lifter magnet).

While you don't technically need anything other than the jars, lids, and screw-bands, these other supplies make the process of making jam much easier and safer.

Step 2: Prepare your canner. If you don't own a canner (see photo), a large, deep pot will do. To avoid the jars touching the bottom of the pot, crumple up some tinfoil and flatten into a circle slightly smaller than your pot's diameter. Rest the jars on the foil disk when placing them in the canner for processing.

The most important thing to ensure is that the pot's sides are high enough that water will be able to cover the tops of the jars when they are submerged.

Bring water to a rolling boil on your stove (one of the back burners). Add your jars and process them in the boiling water bath for 5 minutes, then turn down the heat to a simmer until needed.

 

Step 3: Meanwhile, prepare your lid inserts.  While it's not necessary to boil the screw-bands, the lid inserts do need to be boiled briefly to sterilize them and activate the glue band.  Once the pot comes to a boil, turn down to a simmer and keep it handy.



Step 4: Recipe!
Blueberry Jam
(Original Recipe and instructions courtesy of De Bernardin website)

Yield: 8 x 250 ml jars, or 16 x 125 mL jars
To make this jam, you will need the following ingredients:

• 4- 1/2 cups (1125 ml) fresh blueberries, about 4 pints (2 L)
• 1 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
• 4 tbsp (60 ml) lemon juice
• 2 pouches (170 ml) Liquid Pectin
• 7 cups (1250 ml) granulated sugar

Rinse blueberries, add to a large, deep, stainless steel saucepan, and crush roughly with a potato masher (this may be easier to do 1 cup at a time). 

Add the lemon juice, nutmeg, and all the sugar, and stir together to combine. 




Over high heat, bring mixture to a full, rolling boil that cannot be stirred down.


Add both packets of liquid pectin together, squeezing entire contents from both pouches. Stir into mixture to completely combine; bring back to a full, hard boil for one full minute, stirring constantly.  Remove from heat, skim off foam and discard.

Ladle hot jam into a hot jar to within 1/4" of top of jar (headspace). Using a nonmetallic utensil, remove air bubbles and adjust headspace, if required, by adding more jam. Wipe jar rim removing any food residue. 





 
Center hot sealing disc on clean jar rim. 











Screw band down until resistance is met, then increase to fingertip tight. 






 

Return filled jar to rack in canner. Repeat for remaining jam.

When canner is filled, ensure that all jars are covered by at least 1" of water. Cover canner and bring water to full rolling boil before starting to count processing time. 

At altitudes up to 1000 ft (305 m), process (boil filled jars) for 10 minutes.


When processing time is complete, turn stove off, remove canner lid, wait 5 minutes, then remove jars without tilting and place them upright on a protected work surface. Cool upright, undisturbed, for 24 hours; DO NOT RE-TIGHTEN screw bands.
After cooling, check the jar seals. Sealed discs curve downward and do not move when pressed. Any jars that move up and down (making the *poink!* sound), are for the refrigerator only and are good for up to two weeks.

Remove screw bands; wipe and dry bands and jars to minimize rusting. Store screw bands separately or replace loosely on jars, as desired.  Label jars, and store in a cool, dark place. 

For best quality, use home canned foods within one year.

Tutorial and Recipe: Cream Cheese Berry Tarts

These tiny little tartlets are melt-in-your-mouth delicious, if I do say so myself.  I sort of cobbled together a couple of different recipes, changed a few things up, and came up with these little guys for my wedding dessert table last month.

Even though the pastry is a little finicky (a light touch and not too much flour are the keys to this perfect pastry case), the cream cheese filling made up for it by being a snap to make!  In fact, I had tons left over since I had only made enough pastry for about 18 tiny tartlets; therefore, I'd recommend doubling the pastry recipe to use up all of the cream cheese filling; that way, you don't have to re-roll your scraps more than once (another major no-no that leads to tough and oily tart shells).

When the cream cheese filling (recipe below) is ready, spoon into a piping bag, or in a pinch you can use a large ziploc bag. Set up the baked and completely cooled tart shells to receive the filling, snip the end off your piping bag, and pipe the cream cheese filling up to the top. While it will need to be refrigerated, this filling recipe contains no eggs so it is stable enough to not need baking; it's essentially a "no-bake" cheesecake-type filling.

You can garnish these little guys with anything you like: fresh berries (like I did) or tiny slices of fruit, a small dollop of jelly (note, it may sink to the bottom; pipe slightly less filling in to accommodate the jam), coloured sanding sugar sprinkled over the top, or even pipe some melted chocolate or caramel in a zigzag pattern over the top and sprinkle crushed nuts over that. You can change up the lemon zest and juice to another citrus fruit, but this filling recipe does need a citrus "zing", so don't delete it altogether.

To keep the tart shells crisp, fill them the day you will be serving them.

Cream Cheese Filling
(Original recipe courtesy of Stephanie Jaworski of Joy of baking.com)

• 1-8.oz. pkg full fat plain cream cheese, room temp
• 1-14 oz. tin sweetened condensed milk
• Zest of one lemon
•  1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
•  1 tsp pure vanilla extract

1. In food processor or tabletop mixer, beat cream cheese until creamy and smooth.  
2. Add all remaining ingredients and process until just smooth (do not over-mix or the filling will be too runny).
3. Transfer filling to a bowl, cover, and refrigerate overnight (minimum 6 hours). Can be made up to a week in advance.

Sweet Tart Pastry 
(Original recipe courtesy of Cooksrecipes.com) 

Makes enough pastry for one 9" round tart or 8 individual tart shells or 16-18 mini tart shells

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 tsp table salt
• 1/2 cup plus 1 tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 egg, lightly beaten

1. Sift flour and salt together in a medium bowl and set aside. 
2. Beat the butter with the paddle attachment of a tabletop mixer until softened. Add sugar and beat until light and fluffy. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl with a rubber spatula.
3. Gradually add the beaten egg, beating just until incorporated. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl.
4. Add flour mixture all at once and mix just until it forms a ball. Don't overwork or pastry will be tough when baked. Dough will be sticky.
5. Flatten dough into disk, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 20 minutes or until firm (at this point, you can wrap it very well and chill for up to 3 days).
6. Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface, turning dough frequently to prevent it from sticking and to keep its round shape. Do not turn dough over. The dough should be about an inch larger than your tart pan, and about 1/8" thick.
7. Carefully roll dough around rolling pin. Center over tart pan and unroll over the top. Never pull or stretch the dough as it will shrink away from pan during baking. Lightly press dough into bottom and sides of pan. Roll your rolling pin over top of pan to cut off excess dough. 
8. If making mini tarts, cut circles a little larger than the tart pan cavities (for accuracy, measure the depth of the pan's cavity, and add that number to the diameter of the cavity). Try to align your cuts carefully in order to not have to re-roll your scraps more than once (remember, each re-roll means tougher pastry).
9. Gently but quickly ease each pastry circle into the pan cavities without pulling, stretching, or tearing the dough; the heat from your hands is melting the butter the longer you touch the dough. Ensure the dough circle is firmly against the bottom and walls of each cavity, and neaten up the top edge.
10. Place in freezer for a minimum of 20 minutes to chill. The tart pan can be left in the freezer for up to a day if necessary.
11. If baking unfilled (as in for this recipe), "blind-bake" tart cases first; this is done by lining tart pan with parchment paper or aluminum foil, then filling with pie weights or dried beans, making sure the weights fill to the top of the pan are and evenly distributed over the entire surface. 
12. Bake crust in a 400*F (205*C) oven for 20 to 25 minutes until crust is lightly browned; remove weights a few minutes prior to the perfect golden brown, and finish baking to achieve brownness along tart bottom. Remove weights and parchment, and cool crust on wire rack before filling. 

Can be made and frozen (unfilled) for up to a month.

Tutorial and Recipe: Pineapple-Vanilla Bean Jam

This was the third and final of my three jams I made for my wedding favours last month. 

I had a difficult time trying to decide which preserve I would make to follow as closely to my "yellow" wedding colour; I was originally considering:

• Lemon curd (rejected due to it needing refrigeration and having a short shelf life due to the eggs in the recipe),
• Meyer Lemon Marmalade (ultimately rejected because the season for Meyer lemons was August, therefore kind of late for me; they are very difficult to find even within season; and they are heinously expensive), and 
• Caramel sauce (rejected because it was more tan than yellow, and it also needs refrigeration due to the cream in the recipe).

When I found and read over this recipe for pineapple jam, I was so relieved!  Not only was it simple and inexpensive to make, the ingredients list was stuff I actually already had on hand. Score!

As you can see from the picture, the colour came out a beautiful, sunny yellow, and I was a happy camper.

My Photoshop-talented bridesmaid (at least in comparison to me) made up some incredibly amazing jam jar labels for my three jams, but I was a derp and didn't decide on the pineapple jam in enough time, so I couldn't get them printed in time...hence my narsty printing on the labels.  The very least I can do is show off how awesome the professional-grade labels are that she slaved over in these posts!

Ta Da!!!!

Recipe and a step by step tutorial on how to make this jam is below!

Pineapple-Vanilla Bean Jam 

Original recipe: courtesy of pickyourown.org

Yield: About 4 or 5 half-pint (8oz.) jars

Best Before: 12-18 months post-processing

• 1-20-ounce can of crushed pineapple, undrained
• 1 vanilla bean, split and scraped
• 3 tbsp lemon juice
• 3-1/2 cups of granulated sugar, divided
• 1-1/2 packets powdered pectin
• Jar funnel and jar grabber 
• 1 large saucepan
• 1 large ladle
• 1 Canner(sides must be high enough to cover the tops of your chosen jars with 1" to spare
• Ball or Mason jars, lids, and rings

Step 1 - Gather the Ingredients

Gather the ingredients. In this case, canned pineapple works better, due to its consistency.

Step 2 - Get the jars and lids washed

While you don't need to sanitize the jars prior to filling them, they do need to be washed in hot, soapy water so the jars are clean and hot, and less likely to crack when you put boiling hot fruit in them. I usually like to be safe rather than sorry, so I put my freshly washed jars into my canning bath and boil them for a couple of minutes; that way they are squeaky-clean and hot by the time I'm ready to fill the jars. I take them out of the canner one at a time using rubber-tipped tongs to avoid chipping the glass.

Lids:  Put the lids into a pan of hot water for at least several minutes; to soften up the gummed surface and clean the lids.

 

Step 3 - Mix the pineapple with the pectin

Mix the pectin with 1/4 cup of the sugar (set the rest of the sugar aside for now).  This helps to keep the pectin from clumping up.

 

Stir the pectin/1/4 cup sugar mixture into the chopped fruit. Put the mix in a big pot and put it on the stove.

Notes about pectin: With pineapple I usually add about 50% more pectin (just open another pack and add about half) or else the jam is runnier than I like. BUT pineapple usually thickens pretty well, so try 1 packet and see how well it thickens. With a little practice, you'll find out exactly how much pectin to get the thickness you like. 

 

Step 4 - Bring to a boil

Add the vanilla bean and seeds, and bring the mixture to a full boil. 

Step 5 - Add the sugar and return to a full boil

Add the remaining sugar (about 3.25 cups) and the lemon juice, and bring the mixture back to a full boil.  Once it hits a full, rolling boil, stir and boil for 1 minute.

Step 6 - Fill the jars and put the lid and rings on

Fill them to within ¼-inch of the top, wipe any spilled jam off the top, seat the lid and tighten the ring around them. Then put them into the boiling water canner!

Step 7 - Process the jars in the boiling water bath

Keep the jars covered with at least 2 inches of water. Keep the water boiling. Boil them for 5 minutes (at sea level; see the table below for times at other altitudes).

Recommended process time for Pineapple Jam in a boiling water canner.
		Process Time at Altitudes of
Style of Pack	Jar Size	0 - 1,000 ft	1,001 - 6,000 ft	Above 6,000 ft
Hot	Half-pints or Pints	5 min	10	15

Step 8 - Done

Lift the jars out of the water and let them cool without touching or bumping them in a draft-free place (usually takes overnight). Once the jars are cool, you can check that they are sealed verifying that the lid has been sucked down. Just press in the center, gently, with your finger. If it pops up and down (often making a popping sound), it is not sealed. If you put the jar in the refrigerator right away, you can still use it. Some people replace the lid and reprocess the jar, then that's a bit iffy. If you heat the contents back up, re-jar them (with a new lid) and the full time in the canner, it's usually ok.

It may take up to two weeks for the jam to set and thicken up. It will be runny until then!

Once cooled, they're ready to store.   I find they last about 18 months.  After that, the get darker in color and start to get runny. They still seem safe to eat, but the flavor is bland.  So eat them in the first 12 to 18 months after you prepare them!