About a year and a half ago, I made my first batch of French Macarons. I had read about them online and while they sounded delicious, they seemed nearly impossible to perfect. My first batch was awesome - there were about two macarons that were a bit off. I didn't understand what all the fuss was about. A week or so after that, my husband asked for another batch. With all the confidence in the world, I whipped up a second batch - they were a complete failure. I was devastated, but realized that they are not as simple as I first thought. Clearly, I was super lucky that first day.
The failed second batch, however, lit a fire in me - I NEEDED to figure out what went wrong. I NEEDED to perfect these little guys. I studied, bought books, baked batch after batch, and finally figured them out. There are so many variables that need to be worked out and it seems a major factor in their success is in the mixing, but once you get the feel for how mixed they need to be, they really are quite simple.
I had raved to my mom about them for months and she bought the ingredients ages ago, but wanted to give them a go together. Last night we baked up these guys. The plain colored ones have an almond dark chocolate ganache filling and those with the brown swirl have a simple dark chocolate ganache. Although my mom thinks we added a bit too much almond flavoring to the first ganache, I think they are both delish! K does too.
The macaron gods must have been smiling on us last night, because we killed it. We had one that cracked a bit at the top, but all of the others were parfaite! (I'm no French speaker, but I'd like to think that macarons are feminine.)
We have about 30 of them sitting in the fridge - if you're interested, stop by!
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