Today's recipe is not a cookie recipe to nibble with tea, well you could do that too of course, but a recipe that requires tea in the ingredients. Choose an aromatic herbal tea for this recipe. The originator of this recipe used a raspberry cranberry elderflower herbal blend that yielded a delicious meringue cookie with a lovely colour.
You could try Steeped's Berry Mania.
Berry with Cranberry Chunk Buttercream Meringues
Ingredients
90g Egg Whites, aged & at room temp
144g Confectioners/Icing Sugar
72g Granulated Sugar
117g Almond Meal/Ground Almonds
3 tsp fruity herbal tea, such a Berry Mania
1/4 tsp Candy Pink Powdered Colouring
Method
- Process the confectioners sugar, almond meal & loose tea until the almond meal is fine then sift into a medium bowl to remove any large bits of tea or nuts.
- Tip: If you don't want to see the tea speckles in the shells of your meringue, grind into a fine powder in a mortar and pestle
- Tip: If grinding your own nuts, combine nuts and a cup of confectioners’ sugar in the bowl of a food processor and grind until nuts are very fine and powdery.
- Beat the egg whites in the clean dry bowl until foamy.
- Slowly add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture is glossy and holds stiff peaks.
- Tip: If you turn the bowl upside down they should make no move to fall out
- Fold half of the almond flour mixture and powdered colouring into the meringue, starting quite vigorously then folding more carefully.
- Add the remaining almond meal mixture and fold in carefully. Do not overfold.
- Tip: A good way to tell if the batter is ready is when you fold it onto itself, it should blend back into itself in about 30seconds
- Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a plain half-inch tip. You can also use a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off.
- Tip: It’s easiest to fill your bag if you stand it up in a tall glass and fold the top down before spooning in the batter.
- Pipe 1 1/2 inch mounds of batter onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper.
- Tip: I don't recommend using a silicon mat, I had trouble taking the macarons off each time I used it. Once piped, bang the sheet down on a counter top a couple times to flatten any mounds and bring up air bubbles, also to settle the almond meal to the bottom giving smooth tops.
- Leave the unbaked macarons out to dry, between 30min - 1 1/2 hours.
- Tip: If you have a fan assisted oven you can dry them in less time by just having the fan turned on with the macarons in the oven.
- While the macarons are drying, preheat the oven to 140°C (120°C Fan Assisted)
- Once dry, bake for 15-22mins depending on their size
- Tip: They're ready when you push them and they move very slightly on their feet
- Cool on a rack before removing from the parchment, 15-30mins
- Pipe or spoon with filling and sandwich
Cranberry Chunk Swiss Buttercream
Ingredients
2 Egg Whites
100g Granulated Sugar
175g Unsalted Butter
1/2tsp Vanilla Extract
100g Dried Cranberries, finely chopped
Method
- Combine the egg whites and sugar in a heatproof bowl
- Put the bowl over a pot of simmering water
- Whisk over heat until all the sugar is dissolved and it resembles marshmallow fluff, about 3 mins
- Pour the mixture into a large bowl and beat until the mixture is cool and you have a glossy meringue
- Beat in the butter a tablespoon at a time, making sure it's completely mixed in before adding more
- Tip: At some point it will look curdled, DON'T WORRY! Once you've added all of the butter, just keep beating and it will come together to form a smooth, creamy buttercream
- Beat in the vanilla extract and then fold in the chopped dried cranberry
Meringues last well, so these would be great to make in advance and have on hand for when holiday guests drop in. Or take them to your next potluck.
