Hibiscus has and always will be one of my very favorite flavors to incorporate into baked goods. Its flavor characteristics have a tart, almost cranberry-like flavor, and the color is absolutely stunning. To make your own White Chocolate Hibiscus Ganache Macarons read on my friends!
TIPS FOR MACARON SHELL SUCCESS
A few tips to note before we explore the process of making a macaron!
MISE EN PLACE
The French term “Mise En Place” means to set up your working space in preparation for an activity. With macarons, it’s extremely important to make sure that set yourself up for success before starting. The meringue and batter you will be making are quite sensitive – if you take too much time in-between each step, you won’t see quality results. Take that extra bit of prep to measure your ingredients and prepare the tools you need before starting these macarons.
SIFT, SIFT, SIFT
Another essential tip is to make sure that you are properly sifting the dry ingredients together – both almond flour and powdered sugar. I like to ensure that these ingredients are not clumped together by both using a food processor to first break up these dry bits and then in addition sifting into a clean bowl before incorporating the meringue.
MACARON TEMPLATE
Want to make sure that you have perfectly circular macarons? Use a template! Before I pipe my macaron batter, I like to draw identical circles onto a piece of parchment paper that I will then flip over before piping. You can use a cookie cutter, small lid, salt shaker – anything that is about 1 inch in diameter that you can then trace onto your parchment.
OVEN TEMPERATURE
After renting various apartments throughout the west coast, I have experienced my fair share of…let’s say quirky ovens. Without an oven thermometer, I would not have known that a couple of my ovens were running 50 degrees hotter than what I had actually set my oven temperature to. If you don’t have an over thermometer already, I would highly recommend grabbing one to make these delicate macarons. Here’s the one I use!
EMBRACE THE SCALE
Since macarons require such precise measurements, I would encourage those that do not own a kitchen scale to invest in one! Here’s a link to the scale I used throughout pastry school, and to this day. When working with pastry and confection recipes such as macarons, even a slight over-measurement of say, egg whites, will alter and potentially ruin your recipe. Macarons only require four ingredients – if one of those ingredients is not measured correctly, your odds for macaron success are considerably decreased.
PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT
Remember that making macarons is a technique that takes a few tries to master depending on your experience! I remember practicing macarons at home for the first time while I lived in Seattle. It took some time to really understand why my first few batches weren’t turning out the way I expected. I would look online for tips, watch tutorial videos – anything I could get my hands on to help me develop a process that would work in my kitchen. Finally, I developed this tried and true recipe that I absolutely adore. All that being said – don’t give up and have patience with yourself! You got this.
Hibiscus White Chocolate Ganache
Essentially, ganache is defined as an emulsion of equal parts of chocolate and heavy cream – and in this case, a touch of Hibiscus Leaves! Before we get into the method, let’s break down a few tips to keep in mind in order to make a successful ganache.
- Chop that Chocolate– taking a few moments to roughly chop your chocolate into small pieces will allow for the hot cream to easily melt your chocolate. This leads to a lovely ganache texture and mouthfeel.
- Quality is Key – Since there are so few ingredients in ganache, I’d highly recommend using quality chocolate as the flavors and textures will shine through!
- Heat the Cream Thoroughly – The cream’s temperature needs to be hot enough to gently melt our chocolate. Your cream is ready to pour over chocolate when it comes to a slight boil!
- Softened Butter – Ensuring that the butter is at room temperature will help during the immersion process. If your butter has not been softened, it will be quite challenging to incorporate it into the chocolate & cream mixture.
- Immersion Blender – Using an immersion blender to make ganache will help to make sure that all the ingredients are properly mixed together!
The Method
- Add cream and hibiscus leaves to a saucepan and bring to a boil. Immediately remove from heat, cover and allow to infuse for one hour.
- Strain the infused cream through a cheesecloth, squeezing the leftover hibiscus in order to extract all the infused cream.
- Weigh the cream again to make sure you still have a total of 100g. If not, add a touch of milk until you reach 100g.
- Add infused cream & glucose to a saucepan and bring to a slight boil.
- Remove from heat and pour over the white chocolate. Stir to combine as the warm cream starts to melt the chocolate.
- Add the butter into your warm chocolate mixture and, using an immersion blender, blend ganache until the butter has fully incorporated and your mixture is smooth.
- Allow to cool until the chocolate ganache has cooled before assembly.
Adding Color & Hibiscus Powder
A fun way to jazz up your macarons is to add some gel food coloring into your meringue before the macaronage process! I prefer to use gel food coloring as liquid food coloring adds too much moisture to the meringue and the color is not as intense.
Adding an ingredient such as a sprinkling of hibiscus powder to the tops of your shells once they’ve dried allows for a lovely contrast of color and added flavor! Hibiscus Powder is made from the dried, ground sepals of the hibiscus plant. The hibiscus is then finely ground and has a tart flavor with a deep purple hue!
Maturation & Storing
Technically, allowing your completed macarons to sit overnight in the fridge allows for the best texture for consuming! If you have the patience, place your macarons in the fridge overnight and enjoy the following day. Macaron shells can be stored in the freezer in an airtight container for a month and still taste as good as new! Take the frozen macarons out of the freezer and let them sit for 10-15 minutes before enjoying. In the fridge, filled macarons should be stored in an airtight container for no more than 3 days.
Helpful Equipment for making Macarons
White Chocolate Hibiscus Macarons
Equipment
- Food Processor
- Fine Mesh Strainer
- Mixer with Whisk Attachment
- Spatula
- Bowls
- Parchment Paper
- Baking Tray
- Piping Bags & Piping Tips
- Immersion Blender (optional)
- Saucepan
Ingredients
Macarons
- 76 g (1/3 cup + 1 tsp ) Granulated Sugar
- 90 ml (About 3 egg whites ) Room Temperature Egg Whites
- 80 g (3/4 Cup + 1 Tbsp) Almond Flour, Blanched
- 150 g (1 1/4 Cup ) Confection’s Sugar, Powdered Sugar
- Dried Hibiscus Powder, for garnish
Hibiscus White Chocolate Ganache
- 100 g (1/3 Cup + 1.5 Tbsp) Heavy Cream
- 10 g Dried Hibiscus Leaves
- Whole Milk , As Needed
- 32 g (1.5 Tbsp) Glucose syrup, or corn syrup
- 175 g (1 Cup) White chocolate, Roughly Chopped
- 25 g (2 Tbsp) Room Temperature unsalted butter
Instructions
Macarons
- Line each baking sheet with your prepared parchment templates and prepare your piping bags along with your piping tips. I like to use a small, round piping tips for piping.
- Pour your egg whites into the bowl of a a kitchen aid and start whisking on medium speed. Once they start to foam, slowly add your sugar and bring up your speed to medium for about three to four minutes.
- While your meringue is whisking away, grind together your measured powdered sugar and almond flour using a food processor for one minute. Sift these dry ingredients into a large bowl with a fine sieve and set aside.
- Your meringue is complete when it holds stiff peaks – add desired food coloring and gently whisk for a few additional seconds to incorporate,
- Now it’s time for the ever so important Macaronage! This is the act of mixing your dry ingredients into your french meringue and folding these ingredients enough to allow for the perfect desired consistency. To start, pour your dry mixture onto the meringue and slowly start to fold with a spatula. While rotating the bowl, continue to fold ingredients together. Press mixture on the side of your bowl until the mixture the batter flows off your spatula rather slowly and smoothly. You should see that the batter will drip off the spatula back into the bowl, and rest on top for a moment. Then, the batter from your spatula will slowly sink back into the mixture. One too many folds and your batter could be over mixed leading to it being impossible to work with, so be careful not to overmix!
- Pour your macaron batter into your prepared piping bag and pipe in circles onto your templated parchment paper. In order to get rid of any air bubbles within your piped shells and to even out your tops, tap your baking sheet firmly on a flat surface. You can always use a toothpick to gently pop any extra air bubbles that you see hovering on top of your shells.
- Allow the shells to rest for approximately 30 minutes. Once the top of your shells are dry to the touch they are ready to bake!
- Place your macarons in your oven that has been preheated to 310 degrees Fahrenheit. Bake for 9 minutes, then rotate the baking tray and bake for an additional 2 minutes.
- You will know that your macarons are ready to remove from the oven when you gently touch the upper shell, and it barely moves, while the developed foot of the macaron stays set to the parchment paper. Remove from the oven to cool completely before removing shells from the parchment paper.
Hibiscus White Chocolate Ganache
- Add cream and hibiscus leaves to a saucepan and bring to a boil. Immediately remove from heat, cover and allow to infuse for one hour.
- Strain the infused cream through cheesecloth, squeezing the leftover hibiscus in order to extract all the infused cream.
- Weigh the cream again to make sure you still have a total of 100g. If not, add a touch of milk until you reach 100g.
- Add infused cream & glucose to a saucepan and bring to a slight boil.
- Remove from heat and pour over the white chocolate. Stir to combine as the warm cream starts to melt the chocolate.
- Add the butter into your warm chocolate mixture and, using an immersion blender, blend ganache until the butter has fully incorporated and your mixture is smooth. Allow to cool until chocolate ganache has cooled before assembly.
Assembly
- Once cooled, the shells will peel easily off of your parchment paper. Find each shell's matching half and pipe a circle of ganache into the middle. Finally top with the matching half and add dried hibiscus powder on top for garnish.
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