Chocolate-Hazelnut Macarons

As promised, here is a macaron recipe for you chocolate lovers. Chocolate is a challenge for me because I adore it, but I have become very susceptible to the effects of caffeine. I'm not sure if the cause is all the years of low caffeine consumption while I was pregnant and nursing my babies or if it's just genetics, but the result is that if I have chocolate at night I will llikely lose a couple of hours of sleep.

Cracking hazelnuts for the meringues.
I sometimes will have a luscious chocolate dessert anyway, because there are times when a few hours of sleep is a small price to pay for an excellent dessert. The other solution I have come up with is to have chocolate in the morning. I now keep a(t least one) bar of dark chocolate in my desk at work so that I can have an indulgence without paying a price.

Of course you can try the batter, my dear, you  just have to lick it off your nose!


Folding the chocolate-nut mixture into the meringue.
But I live with a couple of chocolate-loving night owls who would be very happy staying up till the wee hours of the morning indulging in chocolate treats. These macarons seemed like they would make my chocolate lovers happy and I thought I might even justify having one with my breakfast. After all, they're made with egg whites and nuts. Very healthy, no?
The chocolate filling, ready for chilling.


Piping out the macarons and assembling them.
For this batch of macarons, Andrea and I adapted David Lebovitz's Chocolate Macaron recipe. We added hazelnuts and the flavor was excellent with the chocolate. The macarons were thicker than the peach ones that we made, but the meringues were crisp on the outside and chewy in the middle. Again, I think the only thing I would do differently would be to more finely grind the nuts.

The end result is such a fun treat, really different from other desserts. Not a cookie or a cake, just its own special delight. Or as Oscar says, "It's chocolate!" What more do you need?"

The reviews are in!

Chocolate-Hazelnut Macarons

 If you would like to make the macarons in advance, bake the macarons and make the filling, but store them separately, the macarons in an airtight container at room temperature, the filling in the refrigerator. If the filling is stiff when you are ready to assemble the macarons, let it sit out of the refrigerator for a few minutes or return it to the mixer and whip it again.

Adapted from The Sweet Life in Paris (Broadway) by David Lebovitz

Makes about 25 macarons
40 minutes preparation time
about 20 minutes baking time

For the filling:
1 cup heavy cream
4 teaspoons light corn syrup
8 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
2 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces

For the macaron shells:
1/2 cup ground almonds (just less than 1/2 cup whole raw almonds before grinding in a food processor)
1/2 cup ground hazelnuts (just less than 1/2 cup whole raw hazelnuts before grinding in a food processor)
1 cup powdered sugar
12 tablespoons unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
4 large egg whites, at room temperature
10 tablespoons granulated sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

First make the filling. Heat the cream and corn syrup in a small saucepan over medium heat. Just when the cream begin to bubble around the edges, remove the pan from the heat and add the chocolate. Sitr until it has melted completely. Add the pieces of butter and stir them in until it is fully incorporated. Set the pan in the refrigerator to cool.

Next make the macaron shells. Grind the almonds and hazelnuts by running them in a food processor for a couple of minutes until they are extremely fine. At the end of the process, you will need 1 cup of ground nuts. Although this surprised me, it actually takes less than that amount of whole almonds to get 1 cup of ground nuts. Add the powdered sugar and cocoa powder and mix briefly. Set the mixture aside.

In a mixing bowl with a whisk attachment, beat the egg whites until they form soft peaks. Add the granulated sugar and beat again until the mixture is shiny and holds stiff peaks. Add the almond mixture and fold it in with a rubber spatula. Don't over mix the batter at this point. The ingredients should be well-incorporated and even in color but still retain the peaks from the egg whites.

Fit a pastry bag with a plain tip (about 1/2 inch in diameter). Spoon the meringue mixture into the pastry bag. Onto the cookie sheets, pipe out about 50 round disks each 1 to 1 1/2 inches in diameter and 1 inch apart. Gently tap the cookie sheet on the counter a couple of times to level the meringues. Cook them for 15 to 18 minutes, until the top of the shells is firm to the touch. Let the meringues cool completely on the parchment paper (you can gently slide the parchment off the cookie sheet if you want to reuse it) before removing them.

If you like, use a pastry bag to add about a tablespoon of filling onto a macaron and then top it with another. You can also do this with a spoon. Continue until you have assembled all the macarons. Depending on how full you fill the macarons, you may have chocolate filling left over.

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Comments

[Anita]

Making my own macarons seems unbelievably intimidating, although I'm going to try it because they cost a fortune at the bakery. I have 2 questions: (1) I've always called them French macaroons. Do you pronounce "macaron" differently? You know how the French hate you when you mispronounce things. (2) Do you remove the skins from the hazelnuts and almonds?

[Margy]

Anita, in English I pronounce them the same as macaroon, but in French, they pronounce them differently, the o is shorter like macar-on, but with the nasal "n" rather than our English one. I left the skins on the almonds and hazelnuts. I think they add more flavor that way. You can definitely make these!

[Andrea]

For me, macarons and sushi are both in the category of things you've just got to make at home so you can eat as much as you could possibly want! These were so good. I've got egg whites from Tobias's birthday cake in the frige, so I'm thinking it's time to try another batch of something.

[Golden Girl]

I'm looking for a recipe for a cookie exchange. I need to make at least 3 dozen. I was thinking of doing this for the obvious reasons: 1- looks adorable 2- it's chocolate 3- my kids can help!
Am wondering though how well this will keep? Does it freeze well? (We are doing the exchange on the 9th and will not be serving these till christmas.)

[Margy]

Hi, Golden Girl, I think it would be tricky to make these for a cookie exchange, unless they will be eaten with a day or two. The cookie will lose its crispness if stored for a while with the filling. I have not tried freezing the cookies and filling, but I think it would work to freeze them separately. Then let them come to room temperature to assemble them. If it works, let us know!