The Chocolate orange macaron!

Ah the macaron, please do not confuse them with a macaroon, which are also devastatingly gorgeous baked coconut treats, these almond inspired chocolate orange macaron baked delicacies are notoriously tricky to pull off, but trust in me, they are definitely easy to pull off and achieve! In the video above and hopefully here i’ll explain the steps I used to make them, so hopefully you can get inspired and feel confident enough to give them a go too. I mean they look ok right? ….

How to make chocolate orange macarons….

First up, you are going to need to whisk together your egg whites. Whisk them well using an electric whisk or stand mixer until stiff peaks form. Then fold in the sugar and almonds, that’s fold, so that you carefully keep the air in the meringue, keep folding gently until smooth. Oh and if you do not have ground almonds whizz almonds up in a food processor until as smooth as possible.

Meanwhile between two separate bowls using a sieve, sift together the icing sugar and the cocoa powder, this will help mix the flavours and get them nice and fine.

Slowly fold the icing sugar mixture in with the meringue until you have one consisted chocolate coloured mix. Transfer this now to a piping bag using a 1cm nozzle, a good way to fill the piping bag is to use the food hack seen in the video with a tall glass for support.

Pipe circles onto a lined baking sheet, wetting your finger to dab down any points that may stick up, then tap the tray a few times on the surface to remove any air bubbles. Let the tray stand for about 30 minutes so that the lids of the macarons firm up to the touch, meanwhile pre-heat your oven to gas mark 2 or equivalent, see cooking conversion chart.

If you wish like I did, mix some orange food colouring with a little water (2 parts food colour, 1 part water) and flick over the top of the macarons whilst they are firming up, this is just for a visual effect.

In a separate bowl whisk together the butter until smooth and creamy, then gradually add in the icing sugar until fully incorporated. Add some orange extract, mix again and your orange buttercream is complete.

Bake the macarons for 10-15 mins (it took mine 13.5 lol) until firm to the touch and they have risen, allow to cool on a tray briefly before putting on a wire rack to fully cool down.

Add some marmalade on the flat side of a macaron, plonk on some orange buttercream, then press another macaron on top to wedge together. Finish with a drizzle of chocolate orange if you wish – stonking!