When Life Gives You Lemons . . . Make a Tartlet
Macaron Tartlet filled with Chocolate Cremuex and topped with toasted Meringue
When thinking of flavors that I wanted to incorporate for the new cookie menu, macarons were a must. Such an iconic cookie has many versatile uses and can be adapted year round. With simple ingredients (almond meal, powdered sugar, caster sugar, and water) I figured it would be a slice of cake. . . After batch number 4 that notion went out window. Within a week I measured my day by how many batches of macaron I delivered to this world. By batch number 12 I found myself with SO MANY MACARONS and a roommate and partner who stepped down as test subjects. I couldn’t trash all of my hard work, but would never sell the misshapen, lumpy, blown out, cracked, burnt, and sometimes flat product.
Instead of confronting my hoarding habits I was looking for a reason to keep my beautiful rejected babies. Some of the cookies were processed into a colorful powder that will be used to decorate finished product. That’s one batch taken care of. . . Just 4 more to go.
What else could I use cookies for? Then graham cracker crust came to mind. Why not make the macaron into a crust for tarts. My macarons were processed until crumbly and coarse. I added melted butter until mixed by hand until the crumbs held together when squeezed in hand. the ration of macaron is about 260g cookie to 56g of melted butter (undosed*).
*In fusing butter happens with heat in a sealed temperature controlled chamber. Prolonged heating of butter causes separation of the fat and milk solids. After mixing and chilling the butter is softer then its uninfused counterpart.
What greeted me out of my oven was a delicious crust that was crispy with a slight chew and the heavenly smell toasted almonds. To fill the tarts I continued my theme of using macaron byproduct, use the egg yolks to make chocolate cremuex. Crème Anglaise is made then pour over chocolate pieces and whisked to combined, then poured into where it will set.
I topped these tarts with meringue and toasted them. I had fun with piping and topping because why not.
Tartlets are available for catering and cna be dosed to 50mg per tart.
