PB & J Macarons

Counting down the days when we head back to Singers… just another 2 more months to go.  Looking back on my brief expat wife stint, well, it has been short but really memorable.  Have learned loads – improved on my culinary skills, tried to learn French but kinda failed, traveled loads and made a bunch of incredible friends.

Among our small circle of friends in Geneva, I feel really blessed to have met this special group of ladies who hail from America.  On learning that we were going to be heading back to Singapore soon, us ladies decided that we should try to organise a little girlie-trip away from the men.  Nothing too dramatic, just an overnight trip to a place where we could chill and relax.  Fine by me and I was really excited about going away, you know to explore more on Europe before we head back and I guess no better way than to do it with this bunch of adventurous ladies.

Trying to coordinate our schedules was a toughie, I’m partly to ‘blame’ for we’re trying to make the most of our remaining time here so our travel schedules have been really packed.  So L from the Swiss Watch Blog suggested that we get together at her place one afternoon to discuss and get the ball rolling.

I was recently gifted with a Macaron Recipe book by Sam from Schwingen in Switzerland and I wanted to make good this gift by making a batch of PB & J (Peanut Butter and Jam) Macarons for the girls when we have our little discussion. So over our cuppa coffees/ teas plus little bites, we skyped A over at Switzerland Hughes (she couldn’t be there physically because she had to stay in to wait for the plumber) and nailed down the date plus venue for our girlie-trip.  Can’t wait for the trip… there’ll be loads of bubbly and a couple of laughs along the way I’m sure.  Stay tuned!

Finally, here’s the recipe for our tea-time snack – Hazelnut Macarons with Peanut Butter & Jam.  Go on try them, makes a fine treat for a wonderful afternoon with friends. 

Hazelnut Macarons with Peanut Butter & Jam

Makes about 10 filled bite-sized macarons

For Macaron Batter

• 1 egg white (preferably aged for 3 days) brought to room temperature
• A pinch of Cream of Tartar
• 38g icing sugar
• 36g powdered almonds
• 30g granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon of gel-based yellow colouring
• Handful of powdered hazelnuts for topping

Method:

1. Line baking tray with 2 pieces of parchment paper.
2. Sift powdered sugar with the powdered almonds to ensure that there are no lumps.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg white until they begin to foam. At this stage, add the pinch of cream of tartar and the granulated sugar gradually.  Continue beating until very stiff and firm. When you invert the bowl, the egg white batter has to stay put. That’s the time you know when you should stop.  I decided to play it safe and whisked the egg white batter for about 5 minutes before stiff peaks were formed.  Continue to beat the egg whites on high for another 1-2 minutes.  Add colouring to batter.
4. Carefully fold the dry ingredients, in 3 batches, into the beaten egg whites with a flexible rubber spatula (ideally).  Stop folding when the mixture is smooth and there are no streaks of egg white.  I used close to 50 strokes to incorporate the dry mixture into the egg whites.  Slowly scrape the batter into the pastry bag (standing the bag in a tall glass helps if you’re alone).
5. Pipe the batter on the parchment-lined baking sheets in 1-inch circles, evenly spaced one-inch (3 cm) apart.  Sprinkle crushed hazelnuts on top of macaron shells.
6. Rap the baking sheet a few times firmly on the counter top to flatten the macarons and to remove the air-bubbles in the macarons.
7. Leave the macarons out in the open for at least 30 minutes to an hour. This step is important to allow the top of the macaron shell to dry up so that you get a smooth surface for the macarons.  You will know when to pop the macarons into the oven when you touch the macarons and the batter does not stick to your fingers. Be careful not to leave them out too much for it will give you crunchy macarons and you don’t want that. This step is important and if you skip it, your macarons might flatten .  While waiting, preheat oven to 160 degrees C.
8. Bake for 15 mins and let cool completely before removing from baking sheet.

Assembling macarons:

1. Spread peanut butter and jam on the macaron shell.
2. Sandwich and you are done!

It’s recommended that you let the flavours sit inside the macaron for 1 day before having them.  Also recommended that you take the macarons out from the refrigerator 2 hours before eating them.  Enjoy!

~~~~

I’ve been busy in the kitchen… Click here to check out my baking adventures in Geneva.

It’s a Mac Holiday Season!

Okay, last macaron post for the week (or probably for the year) before we go on our Christmas break up in the mountains.  As you can tell I’ve been on a macron overdrive ever since we got back to Geneva.  I was going to give myself a break from all that macaron making but after my festive macarons went a little awry last week, I was tempted to fix the ‘kinks’ and get it right this time.  It was a case of ‘make-or-break’ situation for I only had 1 aged egg-white sitting in the refrigerator.

I was working on a time crunch (not exactly the right mindset for making these petite little things) and boy was I relieved when I got the candy swirls right this time round!  Phew!  When I popped these into the oven, all I could think about was ‘Rise, oh feet, Rise!’ and they did rise albeit being a little lop-sided.

Nonetheless, like a proud mama, I’m pleased to present my ‘Candy Swirl Macarons with Peppermint Mocha Ganache’!  Yeah, you heard me right… Peppermint Mocha Ganache – a flavour inspired by my all-time favourite Starbucks beverage!

I trawled the internet for inspiration and thought long and hard how I could get the flavours to come together.  Questions like ‘Should I do a mint macaron shell with a coffee ganache? Or the other way round?’.  In the end, I infused espresso powder and the peppermint essence together with the cream before heating it up to incorporate into the dark chocolate ganache.  The taste was unbelievable!  The espresso together with the dark chocolate ganache was like mocha, strong and robust but not overtly sweet for the mint aftertaste kicked in thereafter.  This truly was one of my most unusual creations!

Candy-swirl Macarons with Peppermint Mocha Ganache

Makes about 14 filled bite-sized macarons

For Macaron Batter

• 1 egg white (preferably aged for 3 days) brought to room temperature
• A pinch of Cream of Tartar
• 38g icing sugar
• 36g powdered almonds
• 30g granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon of powder-based red colouring

Method:

1. Line baking tray with 2 pieces of parchment paper.
2. Sift powdered sugar with the powdered hazelnuts to ensure that there are no lumps.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg white until they begin to foam. At this stage, add the pinch of cream of tartar and the granulated sugar gradually.  Continue beating until very stiff and firm. When you invert the bowl, the egg white batter has to stay put. That’s the time you know when you should stop.  I decided to play it safe and whisked the egg white batter for about 5 minutes before stiff peaks were formed.  Continue to beat the egg whites on high for another 1-2 minutes.
4. Carefully fold the dry ingredients, in 3 batches, into the beaten egg whites with a flexible rubber spatula (ideally).  Stop folding when the mixture is smooth and there are no streaks of egg white.  I used about 40 strokes to incorporate the dry mixture into the egg whites.  Add the powdered red colouring sparingly over the batter and slowly scrape the batter into the pastry bag (standing the bag in a tall glass helps if you’re alone).
5. Pipe the batter on the parchment-lined baking sheets in 1-inch circles, evenly spaced one-inch (3 cm) apart.
6. Rap the baking sheet a few times firmly on the counter top to flatten the macarons and to remove the air-bubbles in the macarons.
7. Leave the macarons out in the open for at least 30 minutes to an hour. This step is important to allow the top of the macaron shell to dry up so that you get a smooth surface for the macarons.  You will know when to pop the macarons into the oven when you touch the macarons and the batter does not stick to your fingers. Be careful not to leave them out too much for it will give you crunchy macarons and you don’t want that. This step is important and if you skip it, your macarons might flatten .  While waiting, preheat oven to 140 degrees C.
8. Bake for 15 mins and let cool completely before removing from baking sheet.

For Peppermint Mocha Ganache filling

• 50g of dark chocolate (chopped)
• 1/2 teaspoon of Peppermint extract
• 1 teaspoon of Espresso powder (I cut open a Nespresso capsule and used the espresso powder)
• 4-6 tablespoons of cream

Method:

1. Infuse Peppermint extract and espresso powder in cream for 30 mins to 1 hour.
2. Place the chopped white chocolate into a medium size microwave safe mixing bowl. Set aside while you heat the cream mixture.
3. Heat the cream mixture in a small saucepan until just boiling.
4. Pour the cream over the chocolate and leave to stand for two minutes. This will give the chocolate time to soften.
5. Stir the ganache until smooth. If all the dark chocolate has not melted then place the bowl in the microwave and heat for 30 seconds. Remove and stir until smooth.
6. Leave the chocolate ganache to cool until it reaches the desired consistency.

Assembling macarons:

1. Spread peppermint mocha chocolate ganache on the macaron shell.
2. Sandwich and you are done!

It’s recommended that you let the flavours sit inside the macaron for 1 day before having them.

I guess this much about wraps my macaron journey for the year!  Phew.. after countless batches of macarons and close to 20 ‘almost perfect’ ones, I think I’m done making these little ones for a little while… going on a teeny-weeny break before the new macaron adventures begin in 2012.  Hope you found my macaron making adventures a little useful or rather a little entertaining for this noob-baker like me.  I also hoped that it inspired you to try making some of these one day.  It can be rather fulfilling and addictive (as you can tell from my many macaron posts).

Once again, happy holidays to you all!  Have a smashing good time celebrating the festive season.. As for us, we’re off to the mountains sipping our Vin Chaud (mulled wine) and hoping not to fall too much on my bum this time round whilst snowboarding.

~~~~

I’ve been busy in the kitchen… Click here to check out my baking adventures in Geneva.

Merry Macaron-Making

My life in the kitchen has pretty much been all about macarons for the past couple of months.  While I do enjoy an occasional sweet treat, I can’t be eating them all the time!  But what spurs me on is the challenge of making them.  They drive me up the wall – shells cracking, lack of feet, the ‘nipple’ effect on the macaron shells, etc.  But the learning process has been a pretty rewarding experience when the shells come out (almost perfect) from the oven.  Thanks to R from the Pleasure Monger who has been one of my sources for macaron inspiration, I started to dabble and experiment with different fillings for the macarons.

So after slaving in the kitchen, do I end up eating them all?  Hehe, unfortunately not!  Couldn’t afford the extra calories plus the Man doesn’t have a sweet tooth as well.  So once I’m done making and photographing them, they often go to friends and my little Style Princess who will happily eat them on my behalf.

Since the festive season has put me on a mac-baking roll or craze, I decided to play around with flavours that reminded me of the holiday. Peppermint immediately came to mind for this creation.  Peppermint always reminds me of Christmas probably because as a kid, I would always badger my mom to get me a box of the peppermint candy canes. As an adult, my fave holiday beverage has gotta be Starbucks Peppermint Mocha.  There’s something about holding this warm cup of beverage in my hands and listening to Christmas carols as I slowly enjoy sipping on this delicious concoction.

Instead of using almonds to make the macarons, I decided to swap them with Hazelnuts instead.  The result?  A stronger and nuttier flavour that worked very well with the peppermint white chocolate ganache.  Perfect pairing for the festive season!  I wanted to create the red/white swirls just like the peppermint candy canes but somehow the red powdered colouring melded together with the batter.  Arh well, looks like I gotta make up another batch just to try out the swirls again.

Hazelnut Macarons with Peppermint White Chocolate Ganache

Makes about 14-16 filled bite-sized macarons

For Macaron Batter

• 1 egg white (preferably aged for 3 days) brought to room temperature
• A pinch of Cream of Tartar
• 38g icing sugar
• 36g powdered hazelnuts
• 30g granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon of powder-based red colouring

Method:

1. Line baking tray with 2 pieces of parchment paper.
2. Sift powdered sugar with the powdered hazelnuts to ensure that there are no lumps.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg white until they begin to foam. At this stage, add the pinch of cream of tartar and the granulated sugar gradually.  Continue beating until very stiff and firm. When you invert the bowl, the egg white batter has to stay put. That’s the time you know when you should stop.  I decided to play it safe and whisked the egg white batter for about 5 minutes before stiff peaks were formed.  Add colouring.  Continue to beat the egg whites on high for another 1-2 minutes.
4. Carefully fold the dry ingredients, in 3 batches, into the beaten egg whites with a flexible rubber spatula (ideally).  Stop folding when the mixture is smooth and there are no streaks of egg white.  I used about 40 strokes to incorporate the dry mixture into the egg whites.  Scrape the batter into the pastry bag (standing the bag in a tall glass helps if you’re alone).
5. Pipe the batter on the parchment-lined baking sheets in 1-inch circles, evenly spaced one-inch (3 cm) apart.
6. Rap the baking sheet a few times firmly on the counter top to flatten the macarons and to remove the air-bubbles in the macarons.
7. Leave the macarons out in the open for at least 30 minutes to an hour. This step is important to allow the top of the macaron shell to dry up so that you get a smooth surface for the macarons.  You will know when to pop the macarons into the oven when you touch the macarons and the batter does not stick to your fingers. Be careful not to leave them out too much for it will give you crunchy macarons and you don’t want that. This step is important and if you skip it, your macarons might flatten .  While waiting, preheat oven to 140 degrees C.
8. Bake for 15 mins and let cool completely before removing from baking sheet.

For Peppermint White Chocolate Ganache filling

• 50g of white chocolate (chopped)
• 1/2 teaspoon of Peppermint extract
• 3-4 tablespoons of cream

Method:

1. Infuse Peppermint extract in cream overnight.
2. Place the chopped white chocolate into a medium size microwave safe mixing bowl. Set aside while you heat the cream.
3. Heat the cream in a small saucepan until just boiling.
4. Pour the cream over the chocolate and leave to stand for two minutes. This will give the chocolate time to soften.
5. Stir the ganache until smooth. If all the chocolate has not melted then place the bowl in the microwave and heat for 30 seconds. Remove and stir until smooth.
6. Leave the chocolate ganache to cool until it reaches the desired consistency.

Assembling macarons:

1. Spread white chocolate ganache on the macaron shell.
2. Sandwich and you are done!

It’s recommended that you let the flavours sit inside the macaron for 1 day before having them.

I’m pretty happy with how these macarons turned out.. so I decided to finally take the plunge and join the MacTweets Mac Attack #25 Seasons & Holidays Macarons.  I’ve been following MacTweets for a while but never summoned the courage to take part in any of the challenges.  Reason being they just ain’t good enough.. but this time round, I’m feeling a little more confident of my macarons.  What do you think?

Wishing you all a lovely holiday this festive season!  We have a couple more days before Christmas so get into the spirit and indulge in the merry-making by whipping up these yummy macarons.  I’m glad I did for it did bring a couple of smiles to friends as little treats. 

Happy holidays!!!

xoxo: Lady J

~~~~

I’ve been busy in the kitchen… Click here to check out my baking adventures in Geneva.

 

Sweet reunion

I’ve been cooking loads here in Geneva and posting the pictures to my family using ‘What’s App’.  My mom is suitably impressed as with my sisters and they’ve been bugging me to cook for them when I go back to Singers.  The only thing is that when I go back, I don’t really want to do the cooking.  I rather head out, or let my mom-in-law whip up the meal.  Hehe.  I’m lazy that way.  Singapore is a food paradise and there is too much that I want to eat back home rather than to make it myself.

So, ahead of our little family vacation – first to Paris then Pyrenees (Lourdes) and then finishing at Coventry (UK) for the little one’s graduation – I decided to make these macarons for my parents and the little one.

After the success of my chocolate macarons, I was raring to go for more.  I had wanted to bake some for friends to try and so, I baked up batch 2 and 3 within the next couple of days, but those failed terribly.  I was disappointed and wondered if batch 1 was just a fluke.  But undeterred, I woke up bright and early Monday morning and tried my hand at batch 4.  I wanted the family to try some of my hand-made macarons and I was determined to in the words of Tim Gunn ‘Make it work’!

My parents don’t exactly have the sweet tooth so I decided to try making some Vanilla macarons with an earl grey cream cheese filling.  My original plan was to have these macaron shells be in a shade of robin blue.  But after the failure of batch 2 and batch 3, I suspected that I had added too much colouring in the batter.  So I went for simple vanilla shells and for a hint of earl grey scent encapsulated in the shells, I dusted some earl grey tea leaves onto the shells.

Vanilla Macarons with Earl Grey Cream Cheese
Makes about 6 filled macarons

For Macaron Batter

• 1/3 cup powdered sugar
• 1/3 cup powdered almonds
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 1 egg white (preferably aged for 3 days) brought to room temperature
• 2 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• Earl grey tea leaves sifted (I used half a bag of Twinnings Earl Grey Tea)

For Earl Grey Cream Cheese Filling

• 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 50g of cream cheese, at room temperature
• 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 1/4 cup of powdered sugar and 1/2 bag of Earl Grey tea leaves (sifted together)

Method:

1. Line baking tray with 2 pieces of parchment paper.
2. Sift powdered sugar with the almond powder to ensure that there are no lumps.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg white until they begin to foam. At this stage, add the granulated sugar and continue beating until very stiff and firm. When you invert the bowl, the egg white batter has to stay put. That’s the time you know when you should stop.  I decided to play it safe and whisked the egg white batter for about 5 minutes before stiff peaks were formed.  Add vanilla essence and beat the egg whites on high for another 1-2 minutes.
4. Carefully fold the dry ingredients, in 3 batches, into the beaten egg whites with a flexible rubber spatula (ideally).  Stop folding when the mixture is smooth and there are no streaks of egg white.  I used about 30 strokes to incorporate the dry mixture into the egg whites.  Scrape the batter into the pastry bag (standing the bag in a tall glass helps if you’re alone).
5. Pipe the batter on the parchment-lined baking sheets in 1-inch circles, evenly spaced one-inch (3 cm) apart.
6. Rap the baking sheet a few times firmly on the counter top to flatten the macarons and to remove the air-bubbles in the macarons.
7. Dust the earl grey tea leaves on to the macarons (if desired) and leave the macarons out in the open for at least 30 minutes to an hour. This is so that the top dries up and you get a smooth surface for the macarons.  You will know when to pop the macarons into the oven when you touch the macarons and the batter does not stick to your fingers. Be careful not to leave them out too much for it will give you crunchy macarons and you don’t want that. This step is important and if you skip it, your macarons might flatten .  While waiting, preheat oven to 140 degrees C.
8. Bake for 15 mins and let cool completely before removing from baking sheet.
9. In a small bowl, beat together the butter, cream cheese and vanilla essence.  Add the powdered sugar (depending on desired thickness) a little at a time and beating until smooth after each addition.  a
10. Spoon the earl grey frosting on the macaron shell with the earl grey dust and top with remaining macaron shell to form sandwiches.

Again, it’s recommended that you let the flavours sit inside the macaron for 1 day before having them.   I guess by the time my family have these macarons, the flavours would all be infused into the macarons.

I stuck my finger into the Earl Grey Cream Cheese frosting after I finished making the macarons and the frosting tasted delicious.  I didn’t make them too sweet so I’m kinda worried that the filling might melt when I’m transporting the macarons from Geneva to Paris.  But fingers crossed!  I’m hoping that the family would like these little pieces of sugared delights that I’ve put my heart into making them.

Choco Macarons

After weeks and months of ogling at R’s from the Pleasure Monger’s macarons ,I finally summoned enough ‘courage’ to make a batch of macarons this week.   Why is courage needed?  Well, because most of the recipes that I’ve researched online were rather complicated for a ‘simpleton’ cook like me.  Plus, I couldn’t find some of the ingredients such as egg white powder mentioned in R’s recipe here in Geneva.  So, I spent most of this week looking at tonnes of macaron recipes hoping to improvise and find an easy way out.

I now realised that a lot and I mean by my standards – A LOT – of work goes into making these macarons.  The preparation time took close to an hour, not to mention you need to age the egg whites 3 days before making the actual macarons.  After making the macarons, it’s recommended that you let the flavours sit inside the macaron for 1 day before having them.  For an impatient cook like me, that was really tough.  I like things quick, simple, easy and fuss-free if possible.  But making these macarons has definitely taught me a thing or two.

Before I go on to ‘whine’, let me first show off my first-ever attempt at making macarons!  Ta-dah, presenting Lady J’s Chocolate Macarons with Orange Buttercream which tasted oh-so-good!  I let the macarons out to cool to room temperature for about 30 minutes before eating them.

So, I woke up at 7.15am this morning and got right into action.  It felt like I’ve been studying for a major macaron exam of sorts the past couple of days for I’ve just been bookmarking several macaron recipes and re-reading them each night hoping to memorise the steps.  I set my laptop on the kitchen table, got my main ingredients out and started working on putting them together.

It took me close to 40 minutes to sift the almond flour for the powdered almonds I got here had some large chunks of almonds in it. I do not have a food processor so I couldn’t take the easy way out.  After sifting the almond flour and the sugar, I started to beat my egg white and continued to surf the bookmarked recipe to see if I was doing right.  Turned out I was doing it all wrong and my egg white just wouldn’t foam.  Darn!  I trashed the aged egg white and stared helplessly at the rest of my ingredients scattered on the table top.  ‘What am I to do without those aged egg white?’

Then, I remembered what R told me.  Aged egg whites are preferred but she has made macarons using normal egg whites and it had turned out fine.  With renewed faith, I set out taking another egg from the fridge and started from scratch.

I started beating the egg white and then adding the sugar into the whites.  Yay, stiff and firm peaks are starting to form.  That’s a good sign!  Then, I folded in the dry ingredients, mixed it further and stuck the batter in the piping bag.  Well, the batter started to turn watery and as I picked the piping bag up, it started to drip on the floor.  I let out a huge sigh, rushed over to the baking tray and tried to salvage what’s left of the batter.

My piping skills were paltry and what came out on the parchment paper were big globs.  Yucks!  I knew it was going to turn out disastrous but I wanted to see what would happen after it comes out from the oven.  Well, I guess I always have the option of trashing them which I almost did, but a twit-message from Sherie of Maameemoomoo saved the day for she saw that my macarons had feet.  I guess it didn’t turn out that bad then except for the odd sizes.

Chocolate Macarons with Orange Buttercream Recipe (Adapted from David Lebovitz)
Makes about 4-6 filled macarons

For Macaron Batter

• 1/3 cup powdered sugar
• 1/3 cup powdered almonds
• 1 1/2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 egg white (preferably aged for 3 days) brought to room temperature
• 2 1/2 tablespoons granulated sugar

For Orange Buttercream filling

• 1 tablespoon of unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1/4 teaspoon orange zest (more or less according to taste)
• 1 tablespoon (or more to taste) powdered sugar

Method:

1. Line baking tray with parchment paper.
2. Sift powdered sugar with the almond powder and cocoa to ensure that there are no lumps.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg white until they begin to foam. At this stage, add the granulated sugar and continue beating until very stiff and firm. When you invert the bowl, the egg white batter has to stay put. That’s the time you know when you should stop. It took me about 2-3 mins to get there.
4. Carefully fold the dry ingredients, in 3 batches, into the beaten egg whites with a flexible rubber spatula (ideally).  Stop folding when the mixture is smooth and there are no streaks of egg white.  Apparently, it helps to set a limit, like no more than 50 strokes to incorporate the dry mixture into the egg whites) and scrape the batter into the pastry bag (standing the bag in a tall glass helps if you’re alone).
5. Pipe the batter on the parchment-lined baking sheets in 1-inch circles, evenly spaced one-inch (3 cm) apart.
6. Rap the baking sheet a few times firmly on the counter top to flatten the macarons and to remove the air-bubbles in the macarons.  I didn’t rap the baking sheet and my macaron shells had tiny bubbles in them, but that’s ok I guess.
7. Leave the macarons out in the open for at least 30 minutes to an hour. This is so that the top dries up and you get a smooth surface for the macarons.  Be careful not to leave them out too much for it will give you crunchy macarons and you don’t want that. This step is important and if you skip it, your macarons might flatten .  While waiting, preheat oven to 150 degrees C.
8. Bake for 15-18 mins and let cool completely before removing from baking sheet.
9. In a small bowl, beat together the butter, orange zest and powdered sugar.
10. Scoop orange buttercream on the macarons and top with remaining macaron shell to form sandwiches.

Despite the minor mayhem I had in the kitchen, I still managed to make 4 of these chocolate macarons.  I guess if I didn’t spill the batter, I would have 6 of these macarons.

Most of my recipes have been modified as I’m still at experimental stage, so I prefer to cook enough for 2-3 people instead of wasting the food.

After the mini-success of these macarons, I tried making up another batch (thought of making a Robbin-blue macaron with lemon cream cheese filling to let my friends try).  But, the macaron shells cracked, there were no feet and batch 2 failed.  I kept to most parts of the recipe but tweaked the process a little but beating the egg whites for 9 minutes.  Could that be the reason why the shells cracked? Can anyone tell me what went wrong so I know not to repeat the mistake?  Thanks!

Okay, I’m officially hooked and I hope to churn out more macarons in my culinary adventures.