First Macaron Workshop!

Nope, I did not attend one,  in fact, I was invited to conduct one!!!  You read right... yes, me, the amateur baker ...

From my previous post, you would have known I had my fair share of maca-doomsday and of coz, I am pretty damn sure I ain't qualified to conduct a "workshop".    A friend's wife had saw and tasted my macs (the tiffany ones); she is a seasoned baker and tried without much success with her recipes so my role was to share what I presently know, hopefully offering some useful tips along the way.   I'd be in new environment (her house), unfamiliar equipment and oven, the thought was daunting and it'll be super 'ma-lu' - downright embarrassing- to fail the macs in the 'workshop'.. but somehow I found myself getting really excited!

Three days prior, I sent the list of ingredients, equipment and with instructions for aging the egg whites.

THE day arrived - I diligently packed the piping bag, nozzle, mac templates and foolproof* recipe on iPad along for the baking.   I was greeted with enthusiasm by friend's wife A.  From the moment we met, it opened a floodgate of outpouring of the macaroon catastrophes we've both had.   "Think positive!", I reminded myself, for this could be the turning point in achieving where it was lacking in her earlier experiments.

The workshop started off smoothly enough, the step-by-step process was faultless (or so it seemed), she was hands-on in every step along the way.

The macaronage seemed little runny but the texture looked okie.  We pipped out the macs in two trays. Then, we prayed.

20 mins - no shield
40 mins - still no shield
60 mins - do i feel a shield forming? nope, some parts were still sticking to fingers...
110 mins - ... okie if the shield is not forming, it ain't going to form in that next 2 hrs.. so we popped them into the oven.

6 mins into baking the first tray, do not see any feet forming.  8 mins into the baking (and having upped the temp to induce some feet), we saw very, very, very faint, tiny feet starting to form from the back row of macs!  .... AND THEN to the horror of horrors, the mac tops started to crack, one by one.    Oh great, I've completely lost my credibility and self-esteem at this point.  14 mins, macs out and they are under-baked.  In the oven they went for another 4 mins.  Came out still slightly under-baked and with hollow shells.   BUT, they were pretty damn delicious!

The second tray had pretty much the same results, though there were less cracked tops.  Self esteem at negative.

Okie, so I can't have a back-up career as a macaron chef...doesn't take a failed 'workshop' to find that out anyway.  I'll 'kwai-kwai' - obediently (though reluctantly) stick to my day job and rejoice in mac revelry when weekend hits.

Though my mac-ego took a beating, A was pretty upbeat and understanding about the whole thing, citing that getting them right would be a challenge especially working with a different oven from the one I was accustomed to at home.   Though I still felt bad having failed the macs when I left, I knew we had fun in the process.  We'd not stop making macs after this episode, in fact, we'd continue troubleshooting till we get them right every single time, and this is the same attitude that we should all apply to life.   No matter how many successes one has in life, there will always be moments of disappointments and setbacks; the right mindset to overcome these moments will be where one's greatest triumph lies.

Do not let this post stop you from trying to bake macs, they are fun to bake, a delight to eat and a visual treat.   Whenever you are ready, do your research, read up loads, and watch the youtube videos because they provide lots of useful information for you to start your mac journey.  Remember to have fun throughout the process!

PS : *foolproof for me as I've had 3 successes with all 3 attempts with the recipe.