Monday, March 21, 2011

Black Pepper and Strawberry Macs

The MacTweets theme for this month was a spice and a fruit. Weird, but so many delicious combinations! At first I though of the obvious, like apple/cinnamon (yummy!), pumpkin pie (yummier!), and even thought of a lime/cilantro one but besides cilantro not being a spice I really just didn't want to go there! I decided on Black Pepper and Strawberry, which were super delicious! My favorite gelato flavor is an olive oil and black pepper. It is incredibly creamy with just a little bit of a fruity black pepper bite and I DREAM about it it's so delicious! I was hoping for the same effect with the macs. They were good, but next time I will change some things around. Also I decided to give the Italian Meringue version another try. It was better than the first few tries, but I can't quite seem to keep them from being hollow in the middles. Delicious nonetheless, of course! To punch up the strawberry flavor, I ground dehydrated strawberries in a coffee grinder along with the black pepper and filled them with a strawberry jam because I just wasn't sure how a buttercream would work with it. Next time I'll definitely try a mousseline type filling, though.



Here's the recipe that I used with the instructions on Not So Humble Pie's site:

150g confectioners sugar
150g almond meal
185g granulated sugar for syrup (plus one tablespoon for the meringue)
120g egg whites (divided)
50g water
1 tsp black pepper, finely ground
2 TB ground dehydrated strawberries


If you give it a try, let me know what you think!

6 comments:

Lora said...

Strawberry and black pepper shells is such a great idea. I haven't tried te Italian method yet. It's on my list for this year. Love the smooth shells

LadyMacaron20ten said...

What a fantastic combination, strawberry and black pepper sounds absolutely delicious - yum.

Katie said...

Thanks! They're definitely worth trying again, although next time I'll definitely go back to my tried and true French Macaron method. I recently had a black pepper macaron with honey buttercream and it was super yummy as well!

Deeba PAB said...

What a great great flavour combination and beautiful macarons. I also love the idea of rehydrated strawberries in the filling. Thanks for bringing the spice to MacTweets. It's wonderful to have you there!

HI Cookery said...

Interesting flavor combo. Was it spicy? Your macs look very romantic.

Katie said...

They weren't spicy but had a nice, fruity peppery taste. Last week while at a local spice shop, I bought pink peruvian peppercorns that have a very pungent pepper taste without the spice. I will definitely be using these very soon!