I had originally intended on making macarons this week. I bought everything I needed and set out to make them when I got home from work. I checked out some of the posts from Crystal at Windshield Diaries because she is a macaron baker extraordinaire, and…well, I guess I didn’t realize they were so intense. Even though they only consist of four ingredients, baking them perfectly is an art form. A lot of recipes call for “aged” egg yolks set out at room temperature for 24 hours. And there are dozens and dozens of troubleshooting guides. Then I saw this quote from The Times posted in Not So Humble Pie’s Macarons 101:
Even the professionals struggle with macaroons, says Meike Beck, chief home economist at the Good Housekeeping Institute. “Three seconds of overbeating and they’re ruined.” The institute spent a month making hundreds of batches of macaroons, trying to perfect a recipe. In the end it gave up. “They’re best left to the professionals. Macaroon recipes do work. But they are not consistent.” – Times Online
Sigh. Clearly I hadn’t properly prepared myself. Maybe I’ll try these…another time.
So I have the cocoa and eggs and big ‘ole jar of Nutella I was planning on using for the filling of the macarons. What to make, what to make…
Nutella brownies? Ok, sounds good.
I had seen a recipe for Peanut Butter and Nutella Brownies on Noble Pig a while back, but decided to tweaked it a little bit to make it extra Nutella-y.
