{Baking} COFFEE & VANILLA BEAN MACARONS ... Mac Summers Night Dream

"We mac-a-holics are like cats, we will ALWAYS land on our feet, especially when we have each other 4 support!"

Julia @ Always Room For Dessert on twitter

My childhood whizzed by in careless abandon. All her time went in telling me to read more books, read something, and not while my time away. I offered her my deaf ear! I was far too busy climbing trees, jumping off 7 feet walls, {landing on my feet}, catching tadpoles, noisily eating mangoes and tamarind from the trees in our yard, painting for hours together. That was when I was younger. As I grew and the years continued to whiz by, she said the same thing, but my hours were spent with my friends, endless telephone conversations, lying upside down on the cool cement floor listening to music ... still didn't hear her!

What did it matter? Read books? Why on Earth should I? I was happy with the few I read, beginning with the Enid Blyton, Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys, but I was far happier doing art! While my sisters read books from cover to cover in a matter of hours, I painted elephants and clowns, trying to win competitions ... I didn't win many! We had classics lining the shelves, but my glad eye caught Asterix, Tintin, Garfield, Calvin and Hobbes, and Charlie Brown. By the time I reached university, I faced fat volumes of macro and micro jargon in an attempt to do my honours in economics.

What's books and reading got to do with macarons? Seemingly quite a bit in my little corner of the world. Well it was time for Mac Attack #7 and  now my twin sistah Jamie decided to teach me a lesson. MACTELL ME A STORY! STORYBOOK MACARONS.. Excitedly she thought of a theme for our beloved other blog MacTweets which we passionately began a while ago. Who was I to say no Jamie, but I didn't read enough when I was young. Of course I didn't dare tell her!!

Is this what Mum meant when she said you'll suffer when you grow up? Eeeeks people, listen to your MUM! She knows what she is sayin', and even if it doesn't make sense now, it will make a 100% sense in the years to come. looking back, all I can now remember is Mid Summers Night Dream, which  read as part of the curriculum in school, and what a way to recall it! It's the height of summer and I found feet which gladly led me to my Mac Summers Night Dream!

My two favourite flavours in a macaron, sandwiched with a dark chocolate ganache! Truly sensational and just where I would head on a mid summers night! I would sleepwalk to find these delicious feet. deep vanilla flavours coming from vanilla sugar used in the macs, a quarter bean thrown in too while grinding. Coffee, my first love, coming from a wonderful coffee blend that the FSK girl Asha mailed to me from a cafe in NYC! Using the coffee was my best decision. It paired beautifully with the vanilla bean and dark chocolate, and just 1/ a tsp is enough to draw earthy good flavours!

The one thing I remember reading somewhat extensively was Shakespeare, that being part of the school curriculum. With some quirk of fate, it fits in with my mac affairs! William Shakespeare began with writing about comedies, then tragedies and then tragic comedies! Strangely enough my mac adventures seem to follow a similar trend. The titles have an eerie reflection too, or is it my overactive imagination? Much Ado About Nothing, The Comedy of Errors, A Midsummer's Night Dream, As You Like It ...

Well this batch is dedicated to A Midsummers Night Dream, truly reflective of us frying here in the middle of summer, and this would be my dream snack! With flavours that can't win me over better than this, they would make the perfect snack... Sneak into the fridge after dinner, sink your teeth into a luscious full of deep flavour chilled mac ... nirvana!

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ALL YOU WONDERFUL MOTHER'S OUT THERE! These are macarons for you with wishes from the bottom of my heart to the bottom of my FEET! 

These were delectable macarons. Make them for Mom and gift her some mac love! {Sorry I got late in posting these, as I've had HUGE issues with my PC, and it hungrily ate up my macaron pics, among many others. Just been able to retrieve a few!}

Do you want to join us making MACARONS?? If you do, you are most welcome to join us  for the next challenge. You can find all the information at our dedicated macaron blog MacTweets. We generally post the round up by the 15th of every month, following which a new challenge is posted! 

Vanilla Bean and Coffee Macarons with Dark Chocolate Ganache

Adapted from Ottolenghi - The Cookbook

110gm vanilla sugar (or granulated sugar or icing sugar}

60gm whole almonds

60gm egg whites {of 2 eggs}

40gm Castor sugar

1/2 tsp ground coffee

Dark Chocolate Ganache Filling

100gm dark chocolate

2-3 tbsps low fat cream

Whiz the almonds and vanilla sugar with 1/2 a vanilla bean and icing sugar in the coffee grinder till well ground, and sift 2-3 times

Whisk the egg whites and Castor sugar till it forms a thick aerated meringue, firm but not too dry.

Turn the nut mixture into the bowl, and fold gently to get a lava type batter.

In half the batter, fold in the 1/2 tsp of ground coffee beans. Pipe out the macarons, leaving an inch in between each.

Hold the tray firmly and tap the underside firmly. This should help to spread and smooth out the macarons.

Preheat the oven to 140C.

Bake in preheated oven for about 12-13 minutes. They are ready when they readily leave the paper when lifted with a palette knife. Remove from oven as soon as this happens, and leave to cool completely.

Dark Chocolate Ganache

Melt half the chocolate and the cream on simmer in a pan, stirring constantly. Once melted and bubbling, take off heat. Add the rest of the chocolate and stir until all the chocolate has melted. Cool.

To assemble

Match equal halves of macarons, and keep together.

Use a small spoon or piping bag, deposit a tiny amount of ganache on the flat side of the macaron, and sandwich with another of the same size. sandwich them, squeezing gently. Leave to set in fridge.

Note: They taste much better after maturing for 24 hours.

♥ Thank you for stopping by ♥

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