Chocozumbo macarons

During my recent whip around the countryside post Christmas, I stayed for a few nights with my sister. Her teenage son asked me a few weeks ago if I could help him out with a batch of macarons, so of course I had to say yes!

Master 15 is a budding chef, writer, architect, etc etc, and was given Adriano Zumbo's cookbook for his birthday. He has already tried out a few of the macaron recipes, and picked out the Chocozumbo recipe for us to make together. This macaron features chocolate macaron shells, with barbequed corn on the cob which is pureed and added to a white chocolate ganache. We didn't make it exactly as per the recipe, leaving out the corn kernels and corn chips that are sprinkled on the shells. He made the ganache, and I helped out with a few steps making the shells.

I gave him a few tips about

• when the egg whites are beaten enough
• how to tell when the mixture is the right consistency
• weighting the baking paper with magnets so the templates don't slip
• how much to pipe (and shared with him the template that I use), and
• getting the right balance between cooking temperatures and times (something I haven't even mastered in my new oven yet).

You can see on the first tray that the mixture was still a bit stiff, so we mixed it a little more before piping the rest.

Piping the first tray

This wasn't all of them, all up there were approx 100
completed macarons

He decided to experiment with some food colouring on the last tray, and really wanted a giant macaron. I didn't put it back in to cook for longer than the others, and surprisingly, it was only a little undercooked, but as it was so huge it did crack right down the centre.

This is what happens when you put a few drops of undiluted food
colouring onto uncooked macaron shells

We used both oven trays so we could find out which tray cooks more evenly. The top tray was a winner, with perfectly even feet on all shells. Some of the shells that were cooked on the lower shelf had uneven feet, as you can see here.

My attempt at taking a photo of the uneven feet. The side at the right
front of the photo is lower than the other side.

Matched shells awaiting ganache. Can you tell which ones came from the first tray?

The jury is still out on the combination of corn, white chocolate and chocolate shells all in the one macaron, but they turned out just perfectly. Master 15 was pretty chuffed.

Try keeping your hands off them!