Making Macaron Filling

The next step after baking the macaron crusts (view last post) is to make the filling to go in between, completing the macaron. This filling can be anything from sweet cream cheese to tangy raspberry filling and countless other flavors. For my macarons, I decided to make vanilla-flavored butter cream to go with the vanilla flavored macaron crusts that I had made previously.

Vanilla-Flavored Butter Cream Filling

Ingredients:

• 7 tablespoons (100 grams) unsalted butter
• 3 tablespoons (40 milliliters) water
• 3 tablespoons (40 grams) granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• Vanilla extract

Steps:

To start off, I cut the butter into 2 inch pieces and heated them up in the microwave for 10 seconds, continuing until the butter was soft enough to stick my finger to press into (Ogita, 42). Once this was done, I stirred the butter until it became "smooth and creamy like mayonnaise" (Ogita, 42) which helped to indicate when to stop stirring the butter and move on to the next step. 

After stirring the butter, I put water and granulated sugar into a heat-resistant container and stirred. The next step was to heat the mixture in the microwave for about 5 minutes, until the sugar was completely dissolved. This step was actually very difficult because the sugar kept burning and turning the whole mixture black when it was actually supposed to look clear and syrupy. 

The black mixture would have then turned solid and cling to the container as it cooled, which was a nuisance to clean out afterwards. I had to repeat this step over and over, being careful not to burn the sugar in the microwave. I eventually got the mixture syrup-ish without burning it, which was enough for me at that point.

In another bowl, I added the problematic syrup into a bowl with a beaten egg, mixing until the mixture becomes white and heavy. After doing so, I added the butter from the first step and beat it until the butter was well mixed. Ogita pointed out that "While beating the butter and syrup, bubbles may appear that seem to separate the butter from the syrup. You may think you have made a mistake but just continue beating until the butter becomes creamy" (Ogita, 43). This helped to reassure that I wasn't doing anything wrong when the mixture looked questionable, so I was grateful for the pointer.

 After the butter and syrup mixture has become creamy, I added a few drops of vanilla extract, stirring well. After this was done, the filling was complete and I spread the cream into the crusts I had made previously to complete the macarons!

 Although the finished product looks a little ugly and boring compared to the colorful cute macarons you see at bakeries, they tasted just fine (and maybe a little burnt). In my lack of baking experience, if the macarons are edible then it's a success! Hisako Ogita taught me that with more practice, you'll be able to make macarons with no trouble at all.

Q: What is the biggest mistake you've made while baking? 

Ogita, Hisako. I Macarons. San Francisco: Chronicle, 2009. Print.