This week on another episode of choose your macaron adventure, we have gone down the rabbit hole and landed on cinnamon rolls. This macaron has the signature shell smattered with cinnamon and, obviously, a cream cheese frosting in the middle. I mean, should I eat these for breakfast? Absolutely.
This recipe makes about 18-24 macarons. Just a reminder that a food scale is essential here. And since you're weighing things out, you can always double or triple this batch.
For the Shells:
2 egg whites *this is your base weight; this time it was 69 g for the two egg whites
103.5 g almond flour (1.5 x egg white weight)
103. 5 g powdered sugar (same as above)
55.2 g brown sugar (0.8 x egg weight)
1/8 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
A bit of brown food coloring *optional
1. Prepare two sheet pans with parchment and/or silpats. If you're using parchment, draw circles as a guide for your piping. I use a silpat with the macaron circles and just put a parchment paper over it- the parchment tends to release the shells better, but I can still see the circles for a guide.
2. In a bowl, sift together almond flour, powdered sugar, and cinnamon. Set aside.
3. In a stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment, begin to beat the egg whites. Don't go above a 6 speed on a Kitchenaid. Once they start to get frothy, add in the cream of tartar.
4. While that's whisking, sift your brown sugar. I don't know if this is essential, but you're trying to make meringue, and brown sugar is heavy, so I did it and I'll do it again.
5. Start to gently add the brown sugar to the egg whites while they're whipping up. You want to get to a stiff peak here. It may take a bit longer than you're used to because of the molasses in the brown sugar, but it does whip up quite nicely.
6. Once at stiff peaks, put in half of the dry mixture. Gently fold in.
7. Add in the rest of the dry ingredients and beat the shit out of it. You're looking for the batter to be able to fall back into itself and reincorporate within about 10 seconds.
8. If you'd like, at this point, take about 1/3 of the batter into a second bowl and mix a little brown food coloring.
9. Put the batter into two piping bags. Cut a smaller hole into the brown one and a slightly larger hole into the un-colored batter. Put both bags into a larger piping bag with a large hole cut into it. When you pipe, you will get a little brown swirl like a cinnamon roll.
10. Pipe onto prepared sheet pans and then drop or beat the sheet pans on the counter a few times to get the air bubbles out of the shells. These may be dainty, but they like it a little rough.
11. Allow to cure for at least 30 minutes until they become matte and when you touch lightly with a finger, they don't stick. While that's happening, preheat oven to 350F.
12. Right before baking, drop the oven to 325F and bake for 10-13 minutes. To test if they're done, you can gently touch and it shouldn't move too much on its base. *Bake one tray at a time! If you do more, the air doesn't circulate enough, and it can mess up your shells.
13. Allow to cool before filling.
For the filling:
2 tbsp unsalted butter, room temp
2 oz cream cheese room temp
1 1/2 c (ish) powdered sugar
Splash of vanilla
Pinch of salt
More cinnamon if you like
1. First of all, you don't really need this much filling, but you try mixing up just 1 tbsp butter and 1 oz cream cheese. It's nigh impossible, so here we are. In a small bowl, cream together butter and cream cheese with a hand mixer.
2. Begin to slowly add in cream cheese. Add in vanilla and salt (and cinnamon if you'd like).
3. If the mixture is too thick, you can add a splash of milk or heavy cream.
4. Beat until fluffy and put into a piping bag. Cut off tip and gently squeeze some filling onto a shell. Top with a second shell to make the sandwich cookies. You don't need as much filling as you'd think you do, so make one or two before filling the rest to be sure you have a good ratio.
5. Keep in an air-tight container in the fridge. They really are better the next day.
No comments:
Post a Comment