The Intriguing French Macaron

I spend most of my days at work making this quintessential french confection. These petit fours are made with just very few ingredients - Almond Flour, Powdered Sugar, Egg Whites, and Extra Fine Granulated Sugar. They are not like cookies. They are Macarons. I can't call it by any other name.

The intrigue of a macaron stems from the fact that they require precision, patience, and sensitivity.. not just skills. The first few times I started learning to make macarons I was almost intimidated. The outer shell cracked, there's no pied (the ruffle at the base of the shell), they were not holding their shape. You just want to pull your hair out. "This creature doesn't like me!", I told myself. But I refused to give up. And not long enough I unlocked its "secrets".

There are a lot of recipes floating around in the internet and books written just specifically about them. Beautifully written, detailed and instructive. If you really want to learn how to make a macaron my advice is, have a lot of patience and determination. You can attempt to follow the recipe(s) but nothing beats the hands-on experience of being taught by someone side by side. Why I think it is so? It is very sensitive to humidity, sugar syrup and oven temperature. And only then can that teacher can tell you why they behave like so. 

Be brave and you shall conquer the Macaron. It is worth the frustration and sometimes tears!