Chicken Farm Bakers’ Project #3: Let's go BANANA !

Macaron au mocha avec caramel de banane: Mocha Macaron with Caramel Banana filling

Banana, banana, I love banana. This month Chicken farm bakers’ host selects banana to be the star. Actually I want to follow the host’s recipe too (she gives us the banana cake recipe), but I still have a mocaron mission, Haha. My mission began last month when I ordered the book from Amazon fr. I just wanted to have more books about macaron, but I couldn’t find it in English language. I’m lucky enough that I had a chance to learn French when I was in high school (but that time I thought it’s curse, it’s not easy for me). Anyway when my sister saw the books she said that I must make something from the books because she wants to try them. So, I choose this recipe. But I had to change the recipe a bit, because I still not good at making the macaron. My first macaron from new book was a mass, because I didn’t know that my thermometer was broken. I lost 2 batch of Italian meringue before I noticed the problem and I lost 1 batch of macaron because I was too tried to make (The recipe uses very little water and I couldn’t melt the sugar so I put a spoonful of water into the pan, so the ingredient was out of balance). So I used the macaron recipe from:  ............ and the filling from ...................

The recipe from ................. book is very good; I don’t have to keep the door ajar when baking the macaron now. But the key is the egg white had to separate from the yolk and keep in a box for 1 week in the refrigerator, (or leave the box in room temperature for 2-3 days). So, the egg white will liquidize and the macaron won’t crack easily when bake, and you have to let the macorons dry for 30 minutes before baking. And I have to accept that this is the most reliable macaron recipe for me.

Macaron au mocha avec caramel de banane: Mocha Macaron with Caramel Banana filling

Makes about 30

Mocha Italian Meringue Macaron
For the macaron base
68 g	almond powder
68 g	icing sugar
25 g	egg whites
2 tsp	Kahlúa (or other coffee-flavored liqueur.)
1 tsp	Instant coffee
	Yellow food coloring
	Cocoa powder for sprinkle
For Italian Meringue
68 g	caster sugar
15 g	water
25 g	egg whites
Caramel banana filling
70 g	Banana
¾ tsp	Lemon juice
¾ tsp	Dark rum
95 g	White chocolate
30 g	Caster sugar
1 tbsp	Cream
15 g	Butter cut into small pieces

Preheat the oven to 160°C.

Mix the macaron base:

Mix Kahlúa and instant coffee together, stir to combine. Sift together almond powder and icing sugar into a bowl, put the color, Kahlúa mixture and egg white into the bowl. Use a pastry scrap to bring everything together. Set aside.

Make the Italian meringue:

In a sauce pan, put the sugar and water and bring to boil over medium low heat.
When the syrup reaches 114°C, start whisking the egg whites.

The syrup is ready when it reaches 120°C; pour it over the egg whites and continue whisking until cold.

Make the macaron:

Mix together the base and Italian meringue.

The mixture should be softer and very glossy, a little stiffer then cake batter.

Spoon mixture into a piping bag fitted with a 5mm nozzle. Pipe or spoon mixture into 3 cm rounds onto baking paper-lined (or Silpat) oven trays. When you’ve pipe out all the macarons lift each baking sheet with both hands and then bang it down on the counter (you need to get the air out of the batter). Let the macarons rest for 30 minutes, and sprinkle with the cocoa powder before baking.

Bake for 9 minutes to 15 minutes depend on your oven. Remove from oven and cool on trays. Slide a knife under each macaron to release.

Make caramel banana filling:

Put banana, rum and lemon juice in a bowl of the food processor and process until smooth.

Chop white chocolate into small pieces and put in a medium bowl, set aside.

Put the sugar in a heavy saucepan, place the pan on medium heat and cook undisturbed until the sugar begins to melt and caramelize-you’ll see a few wisps of smoke coming out of the sugar. Reduce the heat to low and stir occasionally so that the sugar melts and caramelizes evenly. While the caramel is still very pale add cream to the caramel at arm’s length, averting your face—the caramel will boil up and may splatter out of the pan. Pour the banana mixture into the caramel stir to combine then add the butter, and stir until smooth.

Pour the hot caramel into the white chocolate bowl, stir to melt the chocolate.

Let the filling cool until thick enough (you can put the filling into the fridge to quicken this step).

Spoon the filling into a piping bag fitted with a 5mm nozzle. Pipe the filling into the macorons

Sandwich macarons together.

Refrigerate for at least 1 hour for filling to firm.

Macaron au mocha avec caramel de banane: Mocha Macaron with Caramel Banana filling