Creativity - CAS Project 5/15/21 (Learning Outcome 2)
Another one of the French Pastries I completed during my A-term was the French macaron. I’ll admit it, I’m a little intimidated by macarons. I have attempted making them twice before (once with the Italian method and once with the French) and neither time were they successful. I ended up with cracked shells and overspread macarons and it just ended up being a whole mess. Today I used the French method (obviously, since it was a French baking A-term) and was very determined to succeed.
I began by whipping my egg whites and vanilla, making sure they formed stiff peaks before adding my food coloring and then combining it with an almond flour and powdered sugar mixture. This combination step is called macronage and requires lots of precision. Overmixing it will release too much air from the batter and cause flat and cracked macarons, while undermixing will cause lumpy and hollow macarons. Honestly, they are a lot like goldilocks. They need just the right amount of mixing, just the right amount of flour and sugar, and all it takes is one small mix up and they will be destroyed.
After what I deemed was a sufficient amount of mixing (and hopefully not too much) I piped them into circles and let them dry. The drying step is important, and also one that I think can be difficult in Houston. The more humidity in the air, the longer it takes the macarons to dry, but too much drying causes them to deflate, and too little can stop the signature feet from developing. Did I mention they were like goldilocks?
Nevertheless, after an hour of patiently waiting, my macarons went in the oven. Waiting for them to bake was slightly excruciating, but not quite as bad as taking them out of the oven. If there's one thing I’ve learned about baking, it's that the tables can turn very quickly, especially when something is removed from the oven. Like yesterday, for example, with the deflation of my Paris-Brest. I was concerned I may have a similar result and my macarons would crack as soon as I removed them from the oven due to the rapid change in temperature, but they didn’t!
After letting them cool I delicately moved them to a cooling rack. This step was interesting, because for some of them they were easily removed from the baking sheet, but for others the middle stuck to the sheet and made them difficult to transport. Eventually though, I succeeded, and it was time for assembly!
I quickly made a vanilla buttercream frosting, which in my opinion is the perfect pairing to a macaron because it's simple, classy, goes with basically anything, and is always delicious. Finally, the moment of truth came, and I piped the frosting onto my macaron shells. I was so, so pleased with the result! Most of them ended up beautiful, and just like you see in pictures. This made me so proud, I guess the third try really is a charm. The purple shell with the bright white frosting made a beautiful sight and I was very proud of my macarons. Although a few of them ended up hollow (probably due to being removed from the oven too soon) they still tasted phenomenal and for the most part looked great too! Now that I have had a successful batch of macarons, it makes me much more motivated to try to make these again and continue improving and experimenting with the endless array of colors and flavors. Overall I would say today was a huge success and some of my pictures might even have a resemblance to what you would see in a French patisserie.
This creative display of colors and flavors falls under learning outcome 2, because this is something I have attempted before and it hasn't worked out, but this time I did again and it did work out! One of my biggest struggles with baking is patience, and making sure that I let all the ingredients come to the right temperature, I wait long enough before baking or before taking them out of the oven, and macarons are one of the pastries that if you do not have patience then it is not going to end up the way you want it to. From my previous two experiences making these I learned patience and was able to implement this into the process to make sure they ended up tasty and beautiful!
I began by whipping my egg whites and vanilla, making sure they formed stiff peaks before adding my food coloring and then combining it with an almond flour and powdered sugar mixture. This combination step is called macronage and requires lots of precision. Overmixing it will release too much air from the batter and cause flat and cracked macarons, while undermixing will cause lumpy and hollow macarons. Honestly, they are a lot like goldilocks. They need just the right amount of mixing, just the right amount of flour and sugar, and all it takes is one small mix up and they will be destroyed.
After what I deemed was a sufficient amount of mixing (and hopefully not too much) I piped them into circles and let them dry. The drying step is important, and also one that I think can be difficult in Houston. The more humidity in the air, the longer it takes the macarons to dry, but too much drying causes them to deflate, and too little can stop the signature feet from developing. Did I mention they were like goldilocks?
Nevertheless, after an hour of patiently waiting, my macarons went in the oven. Waiting for them to bake was slightly excruciating, but not quite as bad as taking them out of the oven. If there's one thing I’ve learned about baking, it's that the tables can turn very quickly, especially when something is removed from the oven. Like yesterday, for example, with the deflation of my Paris-Brest. I was concerned I may have a similar result and my macarons would crack as soon as I removed them from the oven due to the rapid change in temperature, but they didn’t!
After letting them cool I delicately moved them to a cooling rack. This step was interesting, because for some of them they were easily removed from the baking sheet, but for others the middle stuck to the sheet and made them difficult to transport. Eventually though, I succeeded, and it was time for assembly!
I quickly made a vanilla buttercream frosting, which in my opinion is the perfect pairing to a macaron because it's simple, classy, goes with basically anything, and is always delicious. Finally, the moment of truth came, and I piped the frosting onto my macaron shells. I was so, so pleased with the result! Most of them ended up beautiful, and just like you see in pictures. This made me so proud, I guess the third try really is a charm. The purple shell with the bright white frosting made a beautiful sight and I was very proud of my macarons. Although a few of them ended up hollow (probably due to being removed from the oven too soon) they still tasted phenomenal and for the most part looked great too! Now that I have had a successful batch of macarons, it makes me much more motivated to try to make these again and continue improving and experimenting with the endless array of colors and flavors. Overall I would say today was a huge success and some of my pictures might even have a resemblance to what you would see in a French patisserie.
This creative display of colors and flavors falls under learning outcome 2, because this is something I have attempted before and it hasn't worked out, but this time I did again and it did work out! One of my biggest struggles with baking is patience, and making sure that I let all the ingredients come to the right temperature, I wait long enough before baking or before taking them out of the oven, and macarons are one of the pastries that if you do not have patience then it is not going to end up the way you want it to. From my previous two experiences making these I learned patience and was able to implement this into the process to make sure they ended up tasty and beautiful!
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