macaroon or macaron?

In this case, macaroons won out for me tonight!

For those of you who don’t know the difference that the extra “o” makes: the macaroon is made with shredded coconut and is crunchy on the outside while nice and soft and chewy on the inside – meanwhile, the macarons are French specialty cookies made from ground almonds which sandwich chocolate ganache. In my case tonight, I didn’t have the ingredients or the time to make the macarons. Perhaps next time!

My oven had been on the fritz for what seemed like ages (read: 2 weeks) so I couldn’t wait until I could finally bake again. Also, school feels like I’m constantly running against a brick wall and I can’t stop, so baking these delicious bites of coconut heaven was a welcoming distraction.

This is my favourite macaroon recipe in the world, and I’ll probably make these more than chocolate chip cookies (shhh, don’t judge me!) or brownies (please don’t boycott me!) – unless people are requesting or demanding chocolate chip cookies or brownies (see! I do what I can to please). It’s very easy, and the only “time consuming” part is waiting for the mix to cool down in the fridge. Other than that, you can whip these up whenever you have a yen for them – which will be fairly frequently after you’ve tasted them once, trust me.

I initially got the recipe from Epicurious, but since I always make double than what their recipe calls for, I’ve made a few adjustments. I cut down on the sugar because I already use sweetened coconut. I’ve reduced the amount of egg whites called for because I use egg whites from a carton for convenience, and it seems to make the mixture more wet than necessary. I also like to toast the coconut before adding the sugar and the egg whites, because I find it brings out the depth and nuttiness from the coconut. Yum!

macaroon, oh macaroon, how lovely you look

with chocolate....

...or without chocolate?

perhaps the best of both worlds! have your macaroon and eat it too!

Recipe

Ingredients:

• 6 cups of sweetened shredded coconut (that’s exactly three of those 200g bags you grab from the store)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 1/4 cup egg whites
• 3 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 tsp almond extract
• 9 oz of semi-sweet chocolate chips for drizzling

How-to:

1. Toast coconut in heavy large saucepan on medium heat until it starts to brown slightly. Add sugar and egg whites, and mix thoroughly. Continue cooking over medium heat until mixture appears somewhat pasty, stirring constantly, about 12 minutes. You don’t want the mixture to be too runny. But if it’s too dry, the macaroons will fall apart in the oven.
2. Remove mixture from heat. Mix in the vanilla extract and almond extract. Spread out coconut mixture on large baking sheet. Refrigerate until cold, about 45 minutes.
3. Preheat oven to 300F. Line another baking sheet with parchment. While the oven is still heating up, use a tablespoon or a melon baller and form the mixture into uniform balls.  Bake cookies until golden, about 30 minutes. Remove cookies to rack and cool.
4. When the cookies are cooled, melt the chocolate chips and drizzle as you see fit.
5. Lick the chocolate bowl clean and eat one, or two, or three, or more macaroons!

xo dessertchick