Little Ivy Cakes

Green Tea Party

(A green-tea meringue cookie with a chocolate ganache filling)

This is what you call a “macaron”-
They come from France and seem to be getting quite trendy.
I just heard about them from a worker-buddy, we will call her “Jannie”, and I had to try making them at once.
The next day when I brought them into work for sampling, Jannie had gotten me one from a Beverly Hills bakery –Thanks Jannie! Here’s what it looked like:

They look perfect don't they! They were pretty good too-light and a little chewy. Mine did not taste anything like the macarons Jannie had before-and she's pretty much like a connoiseur of these cookies. The texture of mine were more merenguey whereas the profesh cookies were more cake-like with a thin crunchy shell.

Another worker-buddy of mine, we will call “Irinie”, complimented me by saying, “I like yours much better because they have more character…..the other ones are just …so plain and boring.”- Thanks Irinie! So I guess I'll stick with this recipe since it was a successful. I think I will also try another macaron recipe and see what happens. :)

This recipe makes approximately 12 assebled cookies

The Macaron batter

1/3 cup matcha green tea powder
½ teaspoon powder blue coloring (optional)
¾ cup powdered sugar
¼ cup granulated sugar
2 egg whites room temperature
½ teaspoon salt
Piping bag and medium round tip

Line a cookie sheet, or two with parchment paper, don’t use wax paper.

Mix matcha powder, powder coloring, and powdered sugar together in a medium mixing bowl then sift into another mixing bowl and set aside.

Whip eggs with an electric beater along with salt until you get medium-stiff peaks.
Sprinkle granulated sugar into eggs and beat until you get stiff peaks.

Sprinkle in the matcha sugar and gently mix together until no color ribbons appear in batter.

Scoop some batter into a piping bag and pipe 1” or whatever size cookie you want onto your cookie sheets, try to be as consistent as possible with your sizes and space each cookie about 1” apart.

Let cookies sit 1-2 hours
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Bake cookies for 5-10 minutes (watch carefully so they don not brown too much)
Let cookies cool completely then remove from parchment paper and put onto a tray.


The Filling

6 tablespoons butter at room temperature
1/3 cup dark chocolate (use your favorite chocolate or chips whatever)
2/3 cup powdered sugar

Melt chocolate in a dry glass bowl over simmering pot of water, take off heat and let cool 5 minutes.

Cream butter with an electric mixer
Add chocolate and mix
Then mix in sugar for your desired consistency.

Sandwich the cookies with the ganache filling in the middle. And serve to people willing to try new things.

The End