Lime Macarons with Coconut Buttercream Filling

Click here to go to printable recipe:  Lime macarons with coconut buttercream filling

I had a few egg whites leftover from my previous post‘s Hollandaise sauce.  I have already shared recipes for merengues, suspiritos and gaznates, three Mexican sweets that make use of egg whites.   This time, I tried a French confection, macarons, a very trendy treat in which flavours and fillings may be easily substituted in lots of different ways; I chose lime and coconut, a classic combination in Mexican cuisine.

It is hard to make perfect macarons, especially on a first try; measuring ingredients carefully, achieving the right consistency of the paste, piping with good technique, allowing time to rest, and baking properly, are some important considerations.  As seen in the photo at the top of this post, my three best-looking macarons show imperfections on the surface, and are just a tad flat, but are shiny and look generally like decent macarons.  The rest of the batch, though, will serve in examples of the many things that could, and went wrong.  Along the recipe below, I provide the corrected final directions, but showing mistakes and caused effects.  The printable recipe takes all this into account, and it is completely edited to reflect corrections for much improved results.

Lime Macarons with Coconut Buttercream Filling –

Macarons de limón con crema de mantequilla con coco

Printable recipe:  Lime macarons with coconut buttercream filling

Ingredients

175 g (about 1 and 2/3 cups) almond flour
175 g (about 1 and 1/3 cups) icing sugar
15 ml (1 tbsp) lime juice
Green food colouring, optional
133 g (about 4 large) egg whites; at room temperature
2.2 g (1/2 tsp) cream of tartar
125 g (1/2 cup) granulated sugar
For the filling:
100g g (7 tbsp) butter; at room temperature
175 g (about 1 and 1/3 cups) icing sugar
25 g (about ¼ cup) dry sweetened shredded coconut

Prepare two baking sheets lined with parchment paper.  Set aside.

Sieve together almond and first batch of icing sugar (photo below, left).  Do not push down the powders, there will be clumps left behind in the mesh (photo below, centre); discard the clumps, then sieve the mix again (photo below, right):

Reserve.

If using food colouring, add to the lime juice (photo below, left).  Mix until colour is uniform (photo below, right):

NOTE:  First mistake; if using colouring, just embrace it and tint the juice much darker than the final desired colour.  My mix looks darker than the pastel green I wanted, but it turned out too pale.

Reserve.

In a perfectly clean mixing bowl, place the egg whites; beat, preferably with an electric mixer, for about one minute, then add cream of tartar.  Continue beating until mix turns white, and soft peaks form when beater is lifted, then add reserved lime juice (photo below, left).  Add granulated sugar slowly, and continue beating until the paste accumulates inside the beater; the paste should be very shiny and firm (photo below, right):

Sift reserved almond mix over the egg mix (photo below, left).  Using a spatula, fold the two mixes together (photo below, right):

Continue folding until very smooth and uniform.  The consistency should be soft, but not runny.

Transfer to a piping bag fitted with a large opening tip (photo below, left).  Place the tip perfectly vertical, about half an inch (1.25 cm) over one of the prepared baking sheets.  Start piping until a circle of paste is formed, then finish with a twirl (photo below, right):

Continue piping circles, leaving at least half an inch (1.25 cm) of space between them.  When finished with one sheet, tap against the counter to flatten the circles, and release air.  Repeat with the other baking sheet.  The photo below shows how one of my sheets looked; the red arrows point to tiny air bubbles remaining in the paste:

Pop the air bubbles with a toothpick.

NOTE: Second mistake; not using a template with circles underneath the parchment.  This led to three issues: 1) circles with different sizes. 2) piping circles too big; when the sheet is tapped against the counter, the tops get flattened, causing the circles to get larger.  Always pipe circles a little smaller than the desired final size. 3) not leaving enough space between circles; a few circles are too close, they could merge during resting or baking times.

Allow to rest for any time between half an hour to an hour, depending on the room’s humidity and temperature, until the circles dry and become dull (they have formed a “skin”).  In the photo below, one sheet after half and hour of resting; most of the circles are dry, except the left bottom, they need a little more time:

I allowed them to rest for another ten minutes (forty minutes total).   

Once circles are nice and dry, preheat oven to 320ºF (160ºC).  Place one sheet in the middle of the oven; bake for 14-16 minutes, rotating the tray half way.  Remove from oven.  Bake the second batch.  

This is the second batch:

NOTE: Third mistake; I actually baked the first batch at 300ºF (149ºC) for 15 minutes.  The circles did not have enough heat to set inside after rising, so they deflated, causing wrinkly tops all around, and very short “feet”, the characteristic spongy bottoms:

The second batch looked much better, but still had issues.  As marked in the photo below, 1) the top left circles are somewhat hollow, that means that they got too hot, so air expanded fast inside, creating a cavity; 2) at the opposite side, again, wrinkly tops, meaning not enough heat. 

Finally, 3) in terms of baking, these circles look good, with smooth and shiny tops, and “feet”:

NOTE: Fourth mistake: full disclosure, I failed to rotate the sheets halfway, so that is what caused these results.

Allow to cool to room temperature.

Meanwhile, prepare the filling.  Place butter and second batch of icing sugar in a mixing bowl, and beat (photo below, left).  Continue until very smooth, and fluffy, then mix in shredded coconut (photo below, right):

Once the circles are cool, they should pop easily off the parchment paper.  Assemble macarons by sandwiching some of the buttercream between two circles:

The rest of my macarons were not pretty, but were all very tasty, good enough for a friendly crowd, and I am confident that my next batch will be much improved.  

The flavours in this fusion recipe, liminal between French and Mexican cuisines, reminded me of a very traditional Mexican sweet, limones rellenos de coco – coconut stuffed limes.  Stay tuned for the recipe in my next post.

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I am bringing my recipe to Full Plate Thursday #686 with Miz Helen @ Miz Helen’s Country Cottage.  Thank you to Miz Helen for featuring My Chilaquiles Divorciados (and Bonus Fusion Bennies).

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I am also sharing my post at Thursday Favourite Things #652, with Bev @ Eclectic Red Barn, Pam @ An Artful Mom, Katherine @ Katherine’s Corner, Amber @ Follow the Yellow Brick Home, and Linda @ Crafts a la Mode.

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I am joining Fiesta Friday #529  with Angie @ Fiesta Friday.

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