DB: Jalapeño Pistachio Macarons

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

Well it's macaron time and it's the perfect way to get myself back into blogging regularly.

Boy it's not easy baking spontaneously (or at all) without any mixing bowls, mixers and ingredients!

So the first thing I did was get myself a mixing bowl and a small hand mixer for the basic mixing and whipping. Then I noticed the oven here was completely unacceptable, the temperature was off and it wasn't the newest model so I got a brand new oven! And now I just have to wait for the shipping from Israel to arrive here in Germany with allll of my baking supplies that were carefully packed (including my kitchenaid!) and I'm all set.

So although I just had a handmixer I actually managed to make macarons, the shells were a little too hard but hey it was my first try ever.

I felt kinda crazy that day and decided on a really funky filling for these: Jalapeño white chocolate and pistachio....Ha! That sounds insane! But it worked! Well I wouldn't recommend making this filling, but I wanted to make something special to remember my first batch of macarons. The jalapeno flavour comes from jalapeno flavoured jelly beans. It's a strange combo but I'm proud of myself for daring, after all I am a daring baker, right?

Jalapeño Pistachio Macaroons:

Shells-

Confectioners’ (Icing) sugar: 2 ¼ cups (225 g.)

Almond flour: 1 cup (95 g)

Pistachio flour: 1 cup (95 g)

Granulated sugar: 2 tablespoons (25 g)

Egg whites: 5 (Have at room temperature)

Filling-

300 ml heavy cream

5 Jalapeño Jelly Beans

150 gr white chocolate

1 tbsp pistachio paste

Shells-

1.Preheat the oven to 200°F (93°C). Combine the confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a medium bowl. If grinding your own nuts, combine nuts and a cup of confectioners’ sugar in the bowl of a food processor and grind until nuts are very fine and powdery.

2.Beat the egg whites in the clean dry bowl of a stand mixer until they hold soft peaks. Slowly add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture holds stiff peaks.

3.Sift a third of the almond flour mixture into the meringue and fold gently to combine. If you are planning on adding zest or other flavorings to the batter, now is the time. Sift in the remaining almond flour in two batches. Be gentle! Don’t overfold, but fully incorporate your ingredients.

4.Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a plain half-inch tip (Ateco #806). You can also use a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off. It’s easiest to fill your bag if you stand it up in a tall glass and fold the top down before spooning in the batter.

5.Pipe one-inch-sized (2.5 cm) mounds of batter onto baking sheets lined with nonstick liners (or parchment paper).

6.Bake the macaroon for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and raise the temperature to 375°F (190°C). Once the oven is up to temperature, put the pans back in the oven and bake for an additional 7 to 8 minutes, or lightly colored.

7.Cool on a rack before filling.

Filling-

In a saucepan place half of the cream with the jelly beans. Bring to a boil and make sure the beans have melted in the cream, pour over white chocolate stir to a smooth cream. Cool for 4 hour in fridge. Then whip chocolate mixture with the rest of the heavy cream and pistachio paste.