I have never tried my hand at painting macarons until this recipe. I have long loved watching tiktoks, instagram reels, and youtube videos featuring people delicately brushing paint onto their macaron shells, but I never thought I’d have the patience. Then I made these blueberry macarons, originally with a white shell, and I was kicking myself for not dyeing the batter. But then, I remembered those painted macarons, and I told myself I could fix my color error. So I grabbed a bottle of vodka, my bright blue food coloring, and I got to work! I love the resulting color, and I really like how the macarons have two colors when you bite in. The white and blue are so pretty together, and I hope you love these blueberry macarons as much as I do.
Do I have to hand paint my blueberry macarons?
You definitely do not have to hand paint your macarons! You could even just add food coloring to the egg whites after you whip it to stiff peaks. That way, the blueberry macarons will have the color the entire way through. But if you are looking to get a little crafty at the same time you are baking, hand painting macarons is such a fun thing to do. It is so easy. Just grab some alcohol, I used vodka for these, and some food coloring. Since my food coloring is gel, I had to thin it out with alcohol. And since alcohol evaporates much more quickly than water, it makes it faster for the macarons to dry. Mix the food coloring and alcohol together until you get a homogeneous mixture. If you find that you want more intense colors, add more dye. If you want less intensity, add more alcohol.
When you finish painting the macarons, it is imperative that you let them dry entirely before assembling. I even went so far as to put my painted macarons in a 250 degree Fahrenheit oven for 7 minutes to make sure the alcohol evaporated off. Once they are dry though, then you will have a green light for adding the filling.
Blueberry Macarons
Ingredients
For the Macaron Shells:
- 3 Egg Whites 100 grams
- ½ cup Granulated Sugar 100 grams
- 1 cup Almond Flour 100 grams
- ¾ cup Powdered Sugar 100 grams
For the Buttercream:
- ¼ cup Unsalted Butter room temperature
- 2 cups Powdered Sugar
- ½ teaspoon Vanilla Extract
- a pinch of salt
- 1 tablespoon Blueberry Jam
For the Jam:
- ¼ cup Blueberry Jam
Instructions
For the Macarons:
- Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. For best accuracy, trace 1-inch circles onto the paper. Flip it over so the side that was drawn on is on the bottom and will not touch the food side.
- In a medium-sized bowl, sift together the almond flour and powdered sugar, set aside.
- In a small or medium sized bowl, combine the egg whites and granulated sugar. Place over a pot of boiling water to form a double boiler. Whisk the mixture until the sugar completely dissolves and the mixture is warm to the touch and frothy. This will take 4-6 minutes.
- Take off the heat and using a hand mixer, whip the egg whites until you achieve stiff peaks. This will take 4-10 minutes.
- Once you have stiff peaks, pour in the sifted almond flour and powdered sugar mixture.
- Using a rubber spatula, fold in the dry ingredients into the meringue in a “U” shaped motion. Continue folding until the batter becomes “drippy” and you can consecutively form a figure “8” in the batter. Youtube tutorials are very helpful for determining when your batter is just mixed enough, and when it is overmixed.
- Once the batter is totally mixed, fill a piping bag with the batter. The piping bag should have a ¼-inch circle tip, or something around there.
- Pipe macaron circles onto the parchment paper on the baking sheet. If you drew circles on it, follow the outline. If you did not, try your best to make them the same size.
- Once all of the macarons are piped, bang the tray on the table top hard. You want to make sure all of the air bubbles are out of the macaron shells, so you want to bang them at least 10 times to make sure there are no hidden bubbles.
- Once you have hit the air bubbles out of the batter, the tops should be fairly flat. Carefully pat down any points that might have resulted from piping them, but they will probably resolve themselves in the drying stage anyways.
- Next, preheat the oven to 310°F and allow the shells to dry for 20-40 minutes until the tops are not sticky when touched. While the shells are drying, you can make your curd and buttercream.
- After the shells have dried, bake the shells in the preheated oven. Rotate them after 5 minutes, of baking, and allow them to bake for a total of 16-20 minutes depending on your oven.
- Once the macarons are baked, take them out of the oven and allow them to cool before filling.
For the Buttercream:
- Beat together softened butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt until combined. Use a spatula to swirl the jam throughout the frosting to make pretty purple streaks.
For assembly:
- On the flat side of a macaron cookie, pipe a circle of buttercream around the outside edge, leaving a little room in the center of the circle. Add about 1/2 teaspoon of blueberry jam to fill the center of the frosting circle. Find the macaron's size mate, and top the buttercream with the other macaron, creating the sandwich cookie. Repeat for all macarons, and enjoy!
- Note: to paint macarons, mix food coloring with vodka and use a clean paint brush to add the coloring to the shells. Allow the painted shells to dry COMPLETELY before assembling.
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