Macarons

For probably close to a year now I've  been wanting to make Macarons, not the coconut ones, but the delicate and pretty sandwich ones. It's taken me this long to give them a try because every blog I've read (and I've read a lot) focus on how difficult they are to make, that almost everything that can go wrong will, and you have to leave your egg whites sitting out to age for a couple of days (that seemed sketchy to me).  Anyway, my friend Melissa recently made some and had success, this gave me the courage to give them a try; I now had someone I could talk to about the techniques she tried and what worked for her, we actually chatted via Gmail the entire time I was making my cookies.

So it went like this:
- I cracked and separated my eggs on Tuesday night and let them sit all day Wednesday and Thursday
- Thursday I got organized; I pre-weighed all my ingredients (every Macaron recipe I've found is in grams so good thing I have a scale), got my mixer fitted with the whisk, and I lined my baking sheets with parchment paper that I'd drawn 1.5 inch circles on so I made the same size cookies
- Now it was down to actually making the cookies, I followed a recipe and instructions from Brave Tart

1. I mixed my egg whites with the sugar and salt - mixed for a total of 9 minutes
2. Sifted the almond flour with the powdered sugar
3. Added the vanilla and coloring to the egg/sugar/salt mixture (meringue) - mixed for one more minute
4. Added the almond/sugar to the meringue and started to hand mix (fold and press) with a rubber spatula, once I thought the consistency was right I spooned the batter into a piping bag fitted with a regular round tip
5. Piped the cookies onto the prepared baking sheets and let sit for 15-18 minutes so they could firm up
6. Then popped them into the oven to bake and crossed my fingers

The results were mildly successful and most importantly they were edible, but here is what I think I did wrong:

1. I didn't sift the almond flour and powdered sugar enough
2. I didn't mix the meringue, almond flour, and powered sugar into the right consistency; my batter was still kind of lumpy and didn't spread like I thought it should
3. I cooked two tray at once (one on top and one on bottom) and I over cooked them...my first batch produced hollow cookies, which I don't think is right
4. My second batch was just one tray and I cooked them for a less time, 15 rather than 18 minutes, they were better but I still think they need to be cooked for less time

All in all, I was very happy with my first attempt.  Having Melissa there to talk to helped a ton and Brave Tart made the whole process seem less scary.  I will definitely be trying these again.

Oh and I used the Bailey's Ganache recipe from my St. Patty's Day Guinness Cupcakes...delicious!!!

ingredients ready to go

ready to go into the oven

they were supposed to be purple

Success (sort of)

Ruffled Flower Cupcake Toppers

As I was perusing the web I stumbled upon these adorable cupcakes toppers from Jessicakes Blog.  Once I saw these I had to try them, they were just so cute.

For my first attempt everything was going fine until I got a couple splashes of water in my Candy Melts as they were melting, I've heard this is a BIG NO NO, well turns out it's very true.  Once I poured the chocolate out to cool it turned into a rock.  I think I might have strained a neck muscle trying to roll it out, I gave up after seven flowers. The ones I  were able to make were also very brittle and cracked easily.

For my second attempt, I was tasked to make them for an engagement party so I had to make sure I got them right.  I was very careful when melting the chocolate to make sure that no water made its way in and let me tell you, it made all the difference.  I also poured the chocolate out very thin on the wax paper so that it would be easier to roll out.  After taking all those precautions the chocolate was much easier to roll out and I was able to get 16 flowers out of one batch.  It was a success! One great tip Jessicakes had for better presentation was to brush the completed flowers with vodka to clean of the left over cornstarch, it totally works and you can't taste the alcohol after.  I took a before picture of my second attempt but completely forgot to take an after picture so I've included an after picture from my first attempt that shows them all cleaned off.

Ready to be formed

Completed flowers before clean up

First attempt

To make modeling chocolate or candy clay you first melt one bag (14 ounces) of Wilton Candy Melts and then mix in 1/3 cup light corn syrup until until it's fully incorporated.  This may take awhile and your chocolate will seem kind of watery for a bit but after some stirring it will go away and you'll have a nice "ball" of chocolate that you can pour out onto wax paper to cool.  I let my cool overnight before I used it but you could probably use it after it's gotten to room temperature.