Green Tea Macarons Take Two

Remember my weak-shelled green tea macarons?

Wasn’t very happy with those, so had to try again.

If you didn’t already know, there are two methods for making the meringue for macarons – French vs. Italian. I’ve never tried the Italian method before, but heard that the shells are much more stable and are less affected by external variables like temperature. This is due to the increased meringue stability.

I tried the recipe from Immersion’s blog – this girl really knows her macarons.

Mass:

• 75g almond meal/flour
• 75g powdered sugar
• 25g egg whites
• 2 tsp matcha powder
• Gel food coloring (optional)
• 1 tsp cornstarch (if weather is humid)

Italian Meringue:

• 60g granulated sugar
• 25g egg whites
• 20g water

1. Mass: Grind then sift almond meal, powdered sugar, and matcha powder together into a large bowl. Add 25g egg whites and mix until it becomes dough-like. Add food coloring if you’d like. Set aside.
2. Meringue: beat egg white(s) in the bowl of your stand mixer until soft peaks form. Don’t overbeat egg whites at this stage. Once soft peaks have formed, decrease mixing speed low (keep them moving so they don’t deflate)
3. At the same time, boil the water and sugar together over medium-high heat (using a candy thermometer). Once mixture becomes bubbly all around with no spots of unboiled water (or 240 degrees F). Pour sugar syrup into egg whites and increase mixer speed to high. Whip mixture until stiff peaks form and the bowl is warm to the touch.
4. Add 1/3 of the meringue to the mass and fold until you cannot see any more white streaks of meringue. Add the rest of the egg whites and fold.
5. Fill prepared piping bag and pipe onto lined baking sheet – used an air-bake sheet w/ a silicon mat.
6. Rap baking sheets a few times to flatten batter. Dry for 20-30 minutes or until dry to the touch
7. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Bake for 10-13 minutes, rotating half way through.

So. Much. Better. No weak-shelled macs here.

Filled with green tea white chocolate ganache. You can find the recipe in my previous macaron post.

I don’t know which method I prefer more yet. The Italian method had a few more steps, but I didn’t really mind.

I guess I’ll have to experiment more with both methods and see which one is more ‘fool-proof’.