These are a variation of the Parisian style macarons we all love; sweet delicate and delicious macarons are the perfect treat. These macarons were inspired by the classic autumnal flavour pumpkin spice. I have never been one to rave about Halloween but do really love autumn so thought I would spend this week celebrating my favourite part of this time, food!! Don’t give up if your first set of macarons aren’t perfect, I am still learning to make these, and they get better every time I do. The trick is to make them again and again as they truly are a skill. But this recipe goes through all the mistakes I made when first making them so you can have the best chance of success!
Top tips: cooking time and temperature are really important to get these macarons perfectly crisp and chewy. However, to get the iconic feet shape at the base you need to be patient and leave them to set until they have a skin on the top.
Serves: 15 macarons
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: 15 minutes
Set time: 30-60 minutes
Ingredients
Macaron shells
100g egg whites
100g icing sugar
100g caster sugar
100g fine almond flour
Pinch of salt
Gel food colouring (orange)
Butter cream
100g icing sugar
100g butter
1tsp chai spice mix
Pumpkin filling
60g pumpkin puree
15g melted butter
30g icing sugar
1 ½ tsp pumpkin spice mix
Method
- Preheat the oven to 150°C and line 3 baking trays with greaseproof.
- Sift the almond flour and icing sugar together twice, this may seem excessive, but it ensures that there is no lumps and gives the macarons a completely smooth elegant finish.
- Whisk the egg whites to soft peaks and the add the sugar gradually and continue whisking until you form stiff peaks.
- Whisk in the gel food colouring until you reach the desired colour, I always prefer to keep the mixture pastel as I think it is more subtle and appetising but do to your preference.
- Gently fold in the sifted sugar and almond flour in three parts, you want to be able to draw a figure of eight with the batter without it breaking part way through. However, do not over mix or knock out too much air to achieve this it is just a guideline for consistency.
- Fill a piping bag with the batter and pipe 1.5 inch circles leaving some room around each one to ensure they don’t run together.
- Bang the tray against the table a few times to release any air bubbles and then leave to set for between 30 min to an hour, you want them to be dry to the touch.
- Place in the oven for 15 minutes you do not want them to colour or go brown, but they should come up from the greaseproof without sticking when they are fully cooked.
- Leave to cool while you prepare the filling.
- In a bowl whip your butter for the butter cream vigorously until it is almost white in colour, then add the icing sugar and chai spices and whisk to combine.
- Mix all the ingredients for the pumpkin filling together.
- Match together the macaron shells finding each a partner of similar size.
- Pipe a thick ring of butter cream around the outside of one, of every pair of macarons.
- Fill the centre of the ring of with the pumpkin filling and gently stack the other macaron on top.
- Eat within 2 days.
#Accessibility (image description: set on a black background there are three macarons they are pastel orange and filled with buttercream. In front of the macarons there is some buttercream and pumpkin filling piped decoratively, showing us what the macarons are filled with.)