This was the perfect weekend to bake. The forecast called for winter weather, including snow, which doesn’t happen very often in South Carolina. Because of that, I didn’t bring with me my snow boots or my car’s winter weather kit (including snow and ice scrapers) when I moved here in 2020. So what else is a frustrated macaron baker supposed to do with her time if she doesn’t want to go outside?

After reading multiple recipes and absorbing tips from multiple bloggers, I gave it another shot yesterday. I don’t have any pictures because I was concentrating so hard on each step. My daughter stopped in for a chat at about the mid-way point and witnessed my frustrations with this go-round. The biggest trouble this time came when was I beating my egg whites for the meringue. They just weren’t getting to the thickness and consistency they needed to be. There were no peaks, not even soft peaks. After throwing out two batches of should-have been-meringue I decided to leave out the food coloring for the third batch. Suddenly my egg whites were behaving! I had peaks! Lesson learned: if the recipe calls for gel food coloring, don’t try a different type of food color. These darn macarons are very finicky!

The rest of the steps went fairly smoothly, although I’m not convinced the macronage process (folding the egg whites into the almond flour/powdered sugar mixture) was perfectly executed. I piped the macarons and let them rest until they were dry and ready to go in the oven. I set my timer but should have watched them a little more closely. I took them out early but they were already a little over-baked. My macarons were pretty small and the baking time was probably for bigger macarons. To solve that I will need to get a bigger piping tip. My kit is a very basic set so I think I will need to upgrade my equipment a little bit if I want better macarons.

So that’s where my macaron project stands right now. I’m getting closer. This last batch is far from perfect but better than its predecessors. Is that good enough? Maybe. Am I ready to move on to something else? I’m not sure. Am I going to get better/bigger piping tips because I may need them for something else even if I never make another macaron?

Probably.