Hey lovelies,
So today I made lavender macarons and just as I was beginning to write this blog post, I asked my self and my fellow roomie Sonya, is lavendar a herb or a flower? Turns out with my handy friend google and wiki answers that infact lavender is a flower and a herb. Fancy that it was like a trick question.
The shells are lightly flavoured with lavender and the shells are sandwiched with a subtle lavender flavoured swiss meringue buttercream. Dusted with a few lavender seeds on the top shells for decoartion.
Lavender Macarons, these little beauties are the perfect thing for a pick me up kinda day.
I love this particular photo and how I composed it. I had seen one similiar on pintrest and tried to replicate it. I think I did a pretty good job because I am very satisfied on how it turned out. Your eyes lead to the sharpest macarons in teh middle and then your eyes are drawn to the back blurry macarons.
I made these macarons and gave them to my Dad who takes them to his work for their smoko. I have always been making them morning teas every weekend for a decent time. When Dad would hand me the tupperware he would say "the boys really like it" but nothing much else. I arrived home yesterday and on the dinning room table was a letter for me. My name was on the envelope in a handwriting I couldn't identify. I open the envelope to reveal a handwritten card, signed by all the workers saying "thank you for the baking it really brightens up our day". It was so nice and I have put it in my box of memories.
I was so touched by the letter, it made me think that sometimes people really do appreciate your hard work. The workers were really smart because by writing just that one letter they knew they would have more baking the next week.
I love lavender I think it is such a versatile herb and flower. I love going out on the farm and picking some lavender to put in a vase with summer roses. It gives such a beautiful fragrance that is so relaxing. Lavender is a herb that is very well known to help you relax, so maybe eat a few of these macaroons and you might put your feet up for a bit. Haha
Since I love lavender so much I really wanted to incoperate in some of my baking. But you have to be really careful where you use it because, too much and you will be choking on the intense flavour.
I loved the bunches of lavender that were used to stage this shot. I think the bunches give it a vintage look to my shoot.
I love the way the shoot was composed, I had originally photographed them on a different set and they looked good, but just not great. So i went back to the drawing board to try a different set. I changed props, I changed the colour wooden boards and I changed the backround. I think the aqua colour contrast well with the voilet colour of the macarons.
I hope you give these a try..
Now for the recipe..
Whisk egg whites until stiff peaks are formed
Fold the almond meal and powdered sugar into the meringue mixture.
Fold in your dry ingredients, until all the dry ingredients are combined.
Do the macaronage test, drop some batter in the bowl and leave it to sit for 30 seconds. If it seems it has sunk back into the mixture you are at the right consitency. As shown in the photos below(left photo 1 sec, right photo 30 sec)
Pipe you macarons on baking paper on a tray, and bake for 9 mins in a preheated oven of 160 degrees. Fill your piping bag with your lavender swiss meringue buttercream.
Line the biscuits and pipe a generous amount on one biscuit between two.
Finish the macaroons off by placing the paired biscuit on top.
Ingredients
-90g egg whites (room temperature)
-110g almond meal
-172g powdered sugar
-3 drops of lavender flavouring
-Purple food colouring gel (or red and blue)
-Cream of tartar
Method
- Begin by preheating your oven to 160 degrees
-Start beating egg whites until they are foamy. At 2 mins add all the sugar and cream of tartar and turn up the speed to the highest and beat the egg whites until stiff peaks are formed
-Fold the dry ingredients (almond and powdered sugar) into the meringue. Fold in the lavender flavouring.
-Once all the dry ingredients are incoperated add your colouring, a little as you go. You can always add more but you can never take out what you have added. Remember that!
-Fill a piping bag and begin piping the mixture onto a baking tray lined with baking paper. Sprinkle some lavender seeds on the macarons when they are still moist.
-Bang the tray on the kitchen bench to release any trapped air bubbles.
-Leave the macaroons to sit and dry out to form a skin
-When you can touch a macaron with you finger with no mixture sticking to you then you know it has formed a good skin.
-Place in the oven for 9 minutes, but turning the tray around half way through the baking time.
-Leave the biscuits to sit on a cooling rack until they are completely cool.
-Fill a piping bag with your buttercream and pipe the filling on the macarons
-Sandwich the two biscuits together.
-Leave in a tupperware for 24 hours for the flavour to mature.
Until next time lovellies...
