Take Five: Macaron, Flax Seed Meal, Chocolate Chili Ganache

What's the worst sweet to make on a rainy, humid day? Macarons. The weather didn't stop me though; I'm such a rebel. You'll notice in the first picture, the egg whites and granulated sugar mixture were colored with some teal gel. By the end of the process, there's barely a hint of the blue. I tried. 

I didn't have almond meal, but I had a full bag of ground flax seed meal. I subbed the 46 grams almond meal, equal measure, with the flax, and 75 grams of powdered sugar. I used 42 grams of egg white, from a store bought ready to go egg white container, with 10 grams of granulated sugar. 

I used a disposable piping bag and generic round tip. I attempted to be careful not to deflate the mixture, but I'm going to be frank and say the flax meal makes a mess in the piping bag, and gives a grittier texture to the meringue. 

I overfilled the macaron circles on the silpat. I'll admit I didn't read the directions twice, just once very quickly. I did let these rest for 30 minutes until they had a bit of a skin or film on the top. I always thought macarons were temperamental, but they can be somewhat forgiving. Somewhat. I've made these before so the method wasn't foreign to me. I very much prefer the French method over the Italian. 

I preheated the oven on convection bake at 300 degrees F. I then lowered temp, and the meringues baked on 280 degrees F for 25 minutes, which may be a tad too much depending on the oven. I checked to see that they meringues peeled freely, enough, from the silpat at 20 minutes. While they cooled, I whisked together a quick semi sweet chocolate and chili powder ganache with a teaspoon of butter and quarter cup of unsweetened almond milk (vanilla). I was thrilled the meringues got some great feet. 

I ended up with an extra meringue, and I fear I may have over cooked them. I suppose they may become a bit chewier overnight. An important point to mention is that you can freeze macaron; you don't have to eat them all right away! Store in freezer paper in freezer ready plastic ware.