101 failures with macarons

Pardon for not blogging lately, I was having some problems after hemorrhoidectomy and am on a controlled diet. Since I have not been traveling around for desserts, daddy, Yuan and I have been trying to make successful macaron shells.

In most blogs or forums, macarons have been labeled to be one of the most difficult items to make in pastries. Though it has the simplest recipe in terms of ingredients, there are too many factors to be considered in making of a successful macaron.

Consecutively 7 attempts, we have come across errors and hiccups, making us change one parameter at a time. The recipe we followed is obtained from Syrup and Tang, involving the use of Italian meringue. And to all first timers, it is important to understand the basics of folding and whisking since the success of macarons depend greatly on the meringue and folding.

Ingredients needed:
Egg white (Please weigh, in this case let's assume to be 100gm)
1.35x Almond Flour Extra Fine (1.35 x 100 = 135gm)
1.35x Icing Sugar (1.35 x 100 = 135gm)
1.35x Caster Sugar (1.35 x 100 = 135gm)
0.297x Water (0.297 x 100 = 30gm)

3 egg whites would yield about 50 shells with a diameter of 40mm.

Steps
1. Mark grease proof paper with 40mm x 40mm squares, spaced 30mm apart
2. Sift icing sugar and almond flour separately
3. Use a spatula and mix the icing sugar and almond flour thoroughly
4. Beat the egg whites until soft peak
5. Fold in HALF the beaten egg whites into the icing sugar / almond flour mixture
6. Add colouring or flavourings during mixing
7. Place caster sugar and water in a saucepan, bring it to simmer over low heat
8. Beat the other HALF of the egg whites to firm peak
9. Set the beater to low speed and slowly pour the hot syrup into the beaten egg whites
10. As soon as all the syrup is in the egg whites, increase the beating speed to maximum until stiff peak
11. Fold in the icing sugar / almond flour mixture / egg whites paste in the meringue (in thirds)
12. Dab some batter under each corner of the baking paper to anchor it
13. Pipe the batter into small domes (i.e. keep nozzle vertical, dip nozzle in and make a small twist)
14. Give the baking pan a good whack on the counter
14. Leave the piped batter to dry for 30min to 1 hour
15. Preheat oven to 150°C
16. Bake the shells for 18 to 20min
17. Sufficiently-baked shells should be easy to peel off from the baking paper

Some things to note:


Note:
Most recipes would suggest processing the almond flour and icing sugar at high speed to achieve a fine mixture but often processors generate lots of heat, causing the almond powder to release oil
Therefore, we decided to sieve almond flour (extra fine) to get fine almond powder before mixing in the sieved icing sugar

Possible Error:
Using a spoon to speed up the process of sifting almond flour will lead to clogging of the sieve due to the released oil. Patience is the trick
I have tried sieving icing sugar and almond flour together but I often get almond flour stuck at the sieve with the icing sugar sieved into the bowl. In the end, we found it more convenient to sieve them separately.


Note:
Most recipes also emphasize on the importance of aging egg whites, since we are always making macarons in an impromptu manner, we left the egg whites in the warm oven (37-40°C) to evaporate the water (i.e. we warm up the oven 4x over a span of 5-6 hours)


Note:
I made a mistake in interpreting Duncan's recipe. The recipe states mixing half the unbeaten egg whites into the dry ingredients, in my 1st to 6th attempts, I used beaten egg whites (soft peak) instead of the unbeaten ones.
The main difference is beaten egg whites (soft peaks) seems to allow the macaron shells to rise higher with more distinctive feet while overbeaten egg whites or unbeaten egg whites appears to generate thinner shells.

Possible Error:
Improper folding may lead to a watery batter
Meringue powder are NOT advisable to replace egg whites, upon mixing in the dry ingredients, the batter collapse into a liquid state



Note:
For preparation of the sugar syrup (to be added to the beaten egg whites), we reduced the amount of water by 10% (we use 0.297x instead of 0.33x).




Note:
Use good baking paper such as Glad Bake (Non-stick baking and cooking paper. When the wrong baking paper is used, you will get the formation of Mt. Fuji instead of a proper macaron.


Note:
The purpose of drying is to form a skin, this will facilitate the formation of a good macaron "cap".

Baking temperature is important. I kept my baking time fixed at 15min while trying to find an optimum temperature.
130°C to 140°C - Shells are undercooked, wet core with soft and flimsy crust
150°C to 160°C - Crisp crust with meaty core (Optimum temperature for my home oven)
170°C - Shells are overcooked and burnt on its crust, chewy core


Note:
Macaron shells should be easy to peel off. If you experience sticky macarons with their bellies behind, you can try to bake it awhile longer.
Alternatively (as suggested by Duncan and Tartelette), you can try to moisten the underside of the baking paper to facilitate the peeling of the shells.


With a shorter baking time (i.e. 16min @ 150°C), the wet bellies get stuck onto the baking paper, making it hard to peel; but the shells are meatier and moist, thereby contrast well with the crisp shells

With a slightly longer baking time (i.e. 20min @ 150°C), the macarons are much easier to peel off and are chewier. I prefer my shells to be softer so I kept my baking time at about 17-18min, upon refrigeration, the shells are still chewy to my liking.

I haven't been adventurous with the flavours and for convenience, I used rose extract and cherry red colour extract, surprisingly the rose fragrance is very distinctive and compliments pretty well with the unflavoured buttercream. I tried using bakeable green tea powder and the taste turns out to be decent. Between the two, most of my guinea pigs prefer the rose flavoured ones.

Despite the amount of sugar and icing sugar used, sweetness is acceptable and is neutralized when filled with (salted) buttercream. All in all, the macarons have no air pockets and we are satisfied with the results. Happy to get it right after a few days of troubleshooting.

And to all my dear readers, I am now left with tonnes of egg yolks, any easy recipes to recommend or share?