Floral Macarons

Pre-heat the over to 170c and prepare your baking tray – pop a macaron template under the parchment paper if you have one.

In a food processor, pulse the ground almonds and icing sugar until fine then sieve.
In a bowl, put the almond mixture and add half an egg white to form a paste. Drop in a hint of food colouring if you’d like to colour them.

Place the remaining egg white into a clean bowl (or stand mixer). Put the caster sugar and water into a pan and bring to the boil. Once the sugar starts to boil and the temperature is about 100c, whisk the egg white into stiff peaks.

When the sugar syrup reaches 115c, slowly pour it into the egg white whilst whisking at medium speed until it’s all incorporated. Continue whisking for 5-10 minutes until the egg white turns thick and glossy.
Add a spoonful of egg meringue mix to the almond mix to loosen then use a spatula to fold in the rest of the meringue.

Pour the macaron mixture into a piping bag with a round nozzle and carefully pipe onto your tray. Once you’ve piped the entire tray, bang the tray firmly on the surface to get rid of any air bubbles. Leave the macarons to skin over for 30-40 minutes before baking.

Bake for 7 minutes then open the over to release the steam and bake for another 7-8 minutes. Once baked, transfer onto a wire rack. Brush a little egg white on the top of the shells and stick on your pressed flowers (best to do this when they’re warm to dry the egg white).

Whilst the shells are cooling, making the chocolate ganache by heating the cream until just boiling, then pouring over the chopped chocolate. Mix well until the chocolate has melted into the cream and leave to cool for 20-30 minutes until it’s a pip-able consistency. Once everything is ready, pout the ganache into a piping bag and pipe a ring of ganache around the edge of the plain shell.

Drop a spoonful of jam in the middle and pop on a floral shell, gently pressing down until the filling starts to ooze out around the edge.