I am one of those people who get something in their head and will stop at nothing to figure it out. Example, these macarons. I have made many French macarons in the past, but about every other time I would make them, something would go wrong. They would either crack, be too bumpy, or would just fall apart.
Then I stumbled across the Laudrée macaron recipe and I felt like my prayers had been answered! Of course this recipe would produce perfect macarons every time, right? Well, not quite. The secret is that you have to follow the recipe exactly. Who knew?
The first time I made the recipe they tasted great, but were just too bumpy. They are certainly not smooth and glossy like Ladurée’s. Turns out that I missed a key step in the process: adding in extra egg white after the batter has been mixed.
The next time, I made sure to get all my measurements just right and follow the steps exactly….and they turned out perfectly! To make sure that it wasn’t a fluke, I tried it again. Once again, perfect macarons!
I could walk you through the whole process of making the Ladurée macaron recipe, but honestly, it’s kind of complicated. I thought it would just be better to show you! So I made a video that shows you, start to finish, how I made them. After the video, I will share with you some of the key steps that I have learned over a couple years of making macarons.
Tips for perfect macarons:
- Weigh your ingredients. Weighing them ensures that your recipe is exactly the same every time.
- Sift, sift, sift. You will notice that I sifted about 4 different times in this video. By doing that, I know that I will have the smoothest possible macaron. It also helps to process the almond flour and powdered sugar together, too. (Notice a difference in the texture of the green vs. the pink macarons? The pink ones were not processed.)
- Use “aged” eggs. I let my eggs sit out over night. Not only is it easier to separate room temperature eggs, but they make a better meringue.
- Wipe down your mixing bowl with vinegar. The vinegar removes any fate deposits from the bowl which could prevent you from getting that perfect meringue.
- Add sugar in stages. When whipping up the meringue, it’s best to add the sugar in stages to make a more stable meringue.
- Don’t over whip the eggs. My issue with previous recipes was that I beat my eggs until they were too stiff which caused them to crack. This recipe tells you to just whip the eggs for one minute between each addition of sugar.
- Don’t under mix the batter. Another issue I had was that I didn’t want to over-mix the batter, so I ended up under-mixing it. That made the macarons too grainy and chewy.
That’s it! I promise that if you follow this recipe exactly, you will have perfect macarons every time.
I will also add that I only made a third of the recipe (well, roughly a third….I measured around only using 2 eggs), which yields about 12 macarons. The full recipe calls for half a dozen eggs, and I didn’t want to waste all those eggs on trial and error. I will share the full recipe in the recipe box below, but also give you my measurements if you only want to 12 macarons instead of 36.
Ingredient measurements for 12 Macarons:
- 90 grams of almond meal
- 80 grams of confectioners sugar
- 70 grams of granulated sugar
- 66 grams egg whites (about 2), reserve 1 tsp to fold in later
- 1 pinch cream of tartar (optional)
- 1/2 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
Of course, to me, the best part of a macaron is the filling! I filled mine with white chocolate ganache and raspberry jam. But you could also fill it with buttercream, lemon curd, Nutella, or any number of your favorite spreads, jams, or frostings. The world is your oyster-shaped macaron!
And if you are curious how I got the marbled tops, visit this post where I show you exactly how to make marbled cookies (and macarons)!
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These look amazing! I love how you decorated the colourful top!
Thanks!! Ill definitely be sharing how i decorated them soon!
Did you use cream of tartar in these macarons?
I’ve made this recipe with cream of tartar and without. The CoT just helps to stabalize the meringue and ensure that you get stiff peaks.
In regards to the 6 and a half egg whites, what size eggs did you use? Do you know how much each egg white weighed (approx)? I feel that since macarons are so finicky, this is probably quite important.
Hi Jonathan. Youre right, macarons are finicky. I used standard large eggs from the grocery store. If you look at my Italian Macaron post, you will notice that I included the weighted measurement of egg whites onstead of just the number.
I believe you were referring to this recipe:
https://followtheruels.com/2017/02/heart-shaped-macarons/
However, I have not been able to find the egg white weight on that page.
I will be trying this recipe today and I hope my 6 large eggs are going to be okay.
I was privileged enough to eat several Laduree macarons last week. They are simply amazing but way beyond my budget so would love to make them at home. Did you get this recipe from Laduree or are they just inspired by Laduree? Either way, the photos look awesome.
Lucky! This recipe is from the Laduree cookbook. I just adjusted the measurements.
Thank you! Finally…macarons that’s aren’t hollow! All the sifting really helped, and the extra egg white at the end really gave them a beautiful shine. I piped mine to a circle about 1.25″, and the recipe yielded well over 140 shells…we’ll be eating macarons for weeks!
Now to make creme brûlée with all the yolks!
Awesome! So glad your macarons turned out well! Sounds like you will be eating them for a while (not the worst problem). Unfilled macaron shells freeze pretty well, so if you still have some left over, that may be a good place for them. 🙂
Feeze the yolks or…… make French Buttercream to inside the macarons next time. You can add so many different items to the buttercream. It’s NOT sweet and is a great counterbalance to the sweetness in the shells!
I love your beautiful page, but I am extremely frustrated regarding the macrons! I do not understand for the life of me, why every macaron expert goes into detail About the importance of the egg whites, yet that is the only ingredient for which there is no gram weight listed. There is such a lack of
consistency online regarding weight for small medium and large eggs as well which makes it more difficult to try to investigate yourself. Any help with this would be greatly appreciated .
The other issue that I’m having involves the beautiful pastel colors shown on your page and many others. If I put two little drops they are anemic looking and not at all attractive and if I put too much then they’re dark and bright. I sure could use help with this!
Thank you again for your lovely website. You’re an inspiration to me!
You are so right, Lisa. Egg whites are always stressed, but in a lot of recipes (including mine), they only include the quantity, not the weight. I actually plan on making macarons this week and I will weight out my egg whites to update the recipe. Thanks for the comment! I am always looking for ways to make the blog and my recipes better!
Thank you so much! I’ll be looking forward to seeing the update!
Hi Lisa and Lindsey,
I just made these macarons yesterday, and 6 egg whites was 195 grams. It’s been anywhere from 192 to 198 in the past, but I use 195 as my guide. I use large eggs, not extra large.
Hope that helps!
Scott
This is so helpful, Scott! I made macarons this weekend and found that most egg whites weigh in around 30-34 grams, which falls right in line with your calculation. I plan on updating the recipe to include the weight. Thanks so much for sharing your research. 😉
That is amazingly helpful, Scott! I was running out of ungrayed hair too pull out, so your answer came just in the nick of time! If you have any info on how to get the shells the beautiful pastel colors, I’m all (appreciative) ears.
May God bless and all your macarons have perfect feet!
Lisa
Lisa, just add extra color. The almond/powder sugar mixture will dilute the color a LOT! Go 4x darker than what you are looking for. You can, if you like, add more coloring as you are doing your macronoge once you have incorporated all dry ingredients. You need to be careful NOT to overmix though..
Hi, so I wanna try to make the macaroons but when you say 6egg whites + 1/2 = 9 in total? Sorry just wanted to make sure … it’s my first time making macaroons….
I think she means six egg whites plus an extra 1/2 an egg white so approx 198g plus 16-17 g.
I made 360 macarons for my daughter’s wedding! One suggestion I would make, and that I read somewhere before taking on the challenge, was to use fine baker’s sugar. It whips/dissolves into the whipped egg whites better because it is fine. Works like a charm.
Also, I would recommend for anyone baking these at home, where oven size is a limitation, make smaller batches – half of the laudere recipe, at a time. When you’re working with a larger batch the unpiped mix will thin out as it sits waiting to be piped. Those macarons will tend to spread more and don’t develop the nice ‘feet’ that is characteristic of macarons. The feet will spread as they bake:(
Smaller batches also allow for changing colors and flavors!
Such great suggestions, Rose! You are a rockstar for making 360 of these!!
Hi. I’m Enrique from México the macarons aré simply jewels thats sometimes haves remorse to eat them,and i’m suppose that you post diferents fillings recipes for macarons in your blog. Thanks and kindle regards.
When I took them out of the oven and let them cool, they were great! But 12 hours later, the shell was crispy and gross. It was like I let a laduree macaroon sit out for a week and it became stale. What did I do wrong?
You didn’t necessarily do anything wrong. Macarons change their consistency after a few hours. Some even think that macarons are better day 2. I would recommend putting them in the freezer if you aren’t going to use them right away.
I find it hard to measure out 1 tsp of egg white. They usually clump or are in a glob?
Can you explain this method of adding a small amount of egg white to the macaronage?
Thanks!
It is easier if you whisk the egg whites before measuring so that it breaks up some of the “connection”.