Macaroons

This is my 3rd attempt at macaroons and they are the only ones that I have been happy to photograph and post the recipe for. The others have tasted good but haven't looked right. They are not easy to make, and I have found that they stick to the baking sheet, so tend to crack when I try to remove them. I think I slightly under cooked these ones last night as they were still a bit soft in the middle. They taste absolutely delicious though. I just filled them with some freshly whipped double cream and some raspberry jam.  They were chewy in the middle, crispy on the outside and just heavenly. I'm going to have another go and try to get the tops smooth and hope to have them rise a little bit more.  I used a recipe from Lorraine Pascales 'Baking made easy'.



Ingredients
Makes about 12
125g icing sugar
125g ground almonds
40g egg whites

2 tbsp water
110g caster sugar

50g egg whites
food colouring (optional)


150ml double cream, whipped

Method
Preheat the oven to 170C, and line a large baking tray with baking paper.
Put the icing sugar, ground almonds and the 40g egg whites together in a large bowl and mix to a paste.

Put the water and caster sugar in a small pan and heat gently to melt the sugar, then turn up the heat and boil until the mixture starts to go syrupy and thickens - if you have a thermometer, it should read 115C/239F at this stage. I just had to guess.

Whisk the remaining 50g egg whites in a small bowl until medium-stiff peaks form when the whisk is removed from the bowl, then pour in the sugar syrup, whisking until the mixture becomes stiff and shiny. For coloured macaroons, add a few drops of food colouring. Tip this meringue mixture into the almond paste mixture and stir gently until the becomes stiff and shiny again.

Spoon into the piping bag. Pipe a little mixture under each corner of the baking paper to stop it sliding around. With the bag held vertically, pipe 4cm flat circles onto the lined tray, about 2cm apart, twisting the bag after each one, (mine were too close so some stuck together, leave plenty of room as they spread whilst cooking) The mixture should be quite loose to give a smooth finish. The piping will leave a small ‘tip’ on each circle so, when they’re all piped, give the tray 2–3 slams on a flat surface to flatten them. 

Leave to stand for 30 minutes to form a skin then bake in the oven for 12–15 minutes with the door slightly ajar until firm. Remove from the oven, lift the paper off the baking tray and leave the macaroons to cool on the paper.

When cool, sandwich the macaroons together with whipped cream. They can be kept for a couple of days, if they hang around that long!