Salted Caramel Macarons

Salted Caramel Macarons
makes about 25 macarons

Macaron shells - What you will need...
125 g pure icing sugar
125 g almond meal
100 g egg whites (At room temperature)
125 g caster sugar
30 ml water (2 tablespoons)
7 g coffee extract
A pinch of yellow coloring to give that golden glow!

Salted caramel - What you will need...
100 g caster sugar
165 g thickened cream (full fat! Don't be scared, this is a necessity!)
15 g salted butter
70 g soften salted butter


Let's get started with making these delicious Macaron shells...

Sift almond meal and icing sugar together through fine sieve and set aside.

Divide egg whites into two equal portions (50 g each portion).  Pour the first portion of egg white (50 g), coffee extract and coloring into the almond meal/icing sugar mixture.  Don’t mix or stir them, just leave them be for a moment...

Put the water and caster sugar in a heavy-based saucepan over medium-high heat. When the syrup starts to boil place the rest of egg white (50 g) into a mixing bowl, using the whip attachment, whip egg white to the soft peak. When the syrup reaches 118°C (on a thermometer), take if off the heat and let it cool down to 115°C.

While the mixer is still running, slowly pour the sugar syrup down the side of the bowl. Be careful not to pour syrup directly onto the whip as it might spatter.

Continue mixing until the meringue cool down to slightly above body temperature (50°C) or when the side of the mixing bowl is warm to touch. The whipped egg white would be stiff and glossy.

Mix a third of whipped egg white into the almond meal mixture and combine them well. At this step, I work the mixture very vigorously to blend the egg white with almond meal mixture. Fold the rest of whipped egg white into the mixture and mix well, yet gently, until the batter is smooth. The batter will be thick. It resembles a very thick cake batter, or as many web sites describe it as a magma-like consistency (I believe it means the thick batter would flow slowly like a magma).

Put the mixture into a piping bag fitted with 1-cm plain tip. Pipe the staggering rows of 1-inch rounds onto baking papers or baking sheets. You will need two trays for this recipe.

 Let the piped shells stand at room temperature for 30 – 60 minutes to let the crust forms. This depends on the room temperature and humidity. When the piped shells are dry to touch without it sticking to your fingers. They are good to go into the oven.

Preheat the oven to 160°C (fan-force or convection oven, increase the temperature by 20°C if you’re using conventional oven) for at least 15 minutes. Just before baking, turn the temperature down to 150°C and bake the macarons for 15 minutes.

Lift the baking papers/sheets off the baking tray to the cooling rack and let it completely cool down before removing macarons (it is easier to remove cool macarons off the sheet. They are also less likely to stick to the paper).

Sandwich cool macarons shell with chilled salted caramel.

Store macarons in airtight container in the fridge. Macaron will taste better after it is chilled overnight.


Let's get started with making the gooey salted caramel filling

This caramel is done using dry-caramel method where sugar are melted on the medium high heat without any water.

Place cream in a saucepan and bring it to the boil. Put it aside and keep it warm.

Add 30 g of caster sugar to a heavy-based small saucepan over medium-high heat. Let the sugar melt and shake the pan every now and then to help sugar to melt. When the sugar is melted, put another 35 g of sugar into the pan and let it melt. Repeat with the rest of sugar.


Leave the sugar caramelised until it turns dark amber. Remove the pan from the heat and add 15 g of butter.

Add warm thickened cream to the sugar mixture. Be careful as the mixture might spatter. Quickly shake the pan to help blending cream and caramelized sugar.

Put the saucepan back to medium-heat and let it boil until it reaches 108°C. Remove from heat and pour the mixture into a bowl. Cover the mixture surface with cling wrap to prevent the skin forming. Set aside to cool down and won't melt butter in the next stage.

When the sugar mixture is cool, beat butter on medium-high speed until it is light and fluffy (approx. 8 – 10 minutes). Mix the sugar mixture into the butter in two batches.

Chill the mixture until ready to use to fill macarons.

Enjoy
- O&O