Hi friends! As promised, I'm back to share the results of my experimentation with making Peach Macarons yesterday. First we start with a pretty photo, so as not to scare any of you away.
Now let me just begin by saying that you should probably never cook anything that you plan to actually eat if you are rushing the clock. In this instance I was two steps into my macaron cookies when I suddenly remembered that in just 20 minutes I'd need to drive my daughter to her math tutoring. I don't think I've ever measured and mixed so quickly (in the process I added in 1/2 cup more powdered sugar than I was supposed to). My sister was sitting in my living room with a deer-in-the-headlights expression watching the whole thing go down. Because of the sudden rush I also didn't have the chance to think through my flavor adaptations. I ended up adding in 1/4 teaspoon of fresh ginger paste on a whim (good decision) but was stuck when it came to adding in the peach (raw peach chunks seemed ill-advised). So with no time to think I quickly piped the cookies onto their pans, gave them a few good whacks on the counter top (to get the air bubbles out), and ran out the door. Fortunately macarons are supposed to be left to rest for at least 30 minutes before baking, so they can form nice crisp tops...unfortunately I wasn't home again until an hour and a half later and boy had they ever crisped up! I wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing, so I stuck them in the oven anyway...what did I have to loose at this point, right?!
While the cookies baked I started melting down some white chocolate for the filling. I found a tasty looking white chocolate peach ganache filling recipe on Tartelette, but since I'm no pro at adapting from metric measurements somewhere along the way everything went south.
The sauce was too runny...even after chilling. I tried melting down some more white chocolate thinking that if I could add that in, it might thicken things up a bit...but then genius that I am, I used the spoon from the chilling chocolate/fruit mixture to stir the melting chocolate and it instantly turned into crusty globs of something closely resembling cottage cheese (I've decided to spare you all by not showing a photo of that). Nine dollars of chocolate ruined! Ugh!
This morning I did about 50,000 google searches for a new macaron filling that would incorporate fresh peaches, but nothing emerged other than a handful of recipes that involve more steps than I could possibly follow. I was about to dump the whole container of plain macaron cookies into the trash in a fit of frustration when I remembered the vanilla ice cream in my freezer! And that is how I turned lemons into lemonade...or naked ginger macarons into dessert for breakfast in this case!
To keep true to my original peachy plan I served the cookie with a few quickly stewed and peeled peaches only to discover that the peaches are horrifyingly bitter (a bit wary about buying from that farmer's market vendor again). Sans peaches...the macaron ice cream sandwich was delicious (messy but tasty)! I'm thinking of picking up a few different ice cream and gelato flavors at the store later today to fill the rest of my wayward batch of macarons with. Disaster somewhat averted!
Final thoughts...I used this macaron cookie recipe (the same one that I used for my Clementine Macarons) and other than being kind of dry because I unwittingly added in too much powdered sugar, they taste awesome. They are easy to adapt and add interesting flavors to (i.e. instead of the citrus zest in the recipe, I just added in a smidge of ginger paste). I still don't have a good peach filling recipe...any tips? Have you ever made macaron cookies before? Do you have a favorite recipe worth passing along? Please do let us know! xo Ez
5 Lovely Comments | 
| by 
