Hazelnut macaron with white chocolate chai ganache Mactweets 13

MacTweets Challenge # 13 is Falling in Love with Macarons, fall being the key word here.

Living in Sub Tropical Queensland a couple of months into spring I struggled a bit in deciding on a fall themed macaron. Nothing really jumped out at me, I toyed with the idea of a pumpkin filling but noticed a few of the other MacTweeters had already taken on that challenge.Nuts......



No, really, then I thought nuts...hazelnuts I would make a noisette macaron.

I searched around the blogiverse for a recipe but nothing jumped out at me so I decided to modify the recipe I already use. It felt a bit risky, but that's the kinda girl I am.....throwing caution to the winds I replaced some of the almond meal with toasted hazelnut meal.

How cute is this stand I bought from Sharnel Dollar Designs

and I LOVED them, more than almond macarons.

The fragrance of the hazelnuts as they toasted filled my house with a wonderful warmth and the finished macaron seemed a little heartier and less sweet.

I filled most of them with a white chai tea infused ganache which had a lovely taste but was a little bit too soft (I've modified the recipe a little to add more chocolate in the below recipe). The remainder I filled with a raspberry jam mix (just IXL shop bought) and those raspberry jam ones were the BEST.

I'm sorry I keep on using capitals but I'm a bit overexcited with these new macarons I came up with, I'm sure you'll love them too. Recipe after jump.....

Lolli-cake-pops tutorial and cake pop bouquet

By popular vote on my facebook page I am doing a tutorial on the lolli-cake-pops I made up.

But first I'm going to share the story of how I came up with these pops as Amanda asked how I come up with these ideas.

Saw some cute dagashi inspired marshmallows on the decorated cookie blog and I thought wow - they are super cute might try making some cake pops like this.

Timing was just before Halloween so I tried out some Halloween inspired ones. I considered these a big fail which is why you didn't see the pics. Will be going back to these with a new improved formula/process one day soon.

However while I was covering them in marshmallow fondant I saw a vision of lollipop cookie pops and that's how I got to these.
 

and while I was making these I came up with another great idea which if they work I'll share as well.

Yup that's me...... I see cake in almost everything I look at.

Then after I finished making them I was inspired to make a lollipop cookie pop bouquet by gorgeous photo's I've seen around of lollipop wedding bouquets.

Hint - if you are making the pops for a bouquet use real candy melts not just white chocolate like I did in my second batch as the candy melts set harder and will not smudge while your manipulating your pops around in the bouquet.

The bouquets were really cute and they would probably make a perfect little flower girl bouquet if you can stop the kids from eating them for long enough....

Oh and great news I have a cookbook being released in the US December 2011 - here is a link to Amazon, the preorder price is ah-mazing. Stacks more recipes and ideas for pops and other treats on a stick:



Anyway I know you just want the tutorial so here you go. Recipe after jump.

Cupcake pom picks from Ah Tissue Loving them

 

Thought I would share some pictures of these cute new Australian hand made cupcake pom picks from Ah-Tissue,
how gorgeous are they...... look how effortlessly they add height and colour to the cupcakes.

I was lucky enough to be able to make up the cupcakes and fondant toppers to help showcase this new product.

I sooooo love it when someone who actually knows what they are doing with a camera takes photo's of my treats they always look 100% nicer.

Cute Christmas cupcakes


sweet little ladybird topper

 Baby boy and girl perfect for a baby shower.....


and it goes without saying that I love the pink cupcake pom pick, but I think this one below is my favourite


It makes me think of a delicious neapolitan ice-cream.

Cupcake pom picks - Loving them!

Ah Tissue has a wide range of pom pom products available which are perfect for dressing up your party table


Cupcake pom pics from Ah-Tissue

Cupcakes and fondant edible toppers Bubble and Sweet

Cupcake wrappers by The Cupcake Wrapper Co

All images belong to Ah Tissue and used with permission.

Stuff I've been up to

I'm feeling very guilty at the moment and have been being a bad bad blogger.

Although I have been neglecting the blog I have been busy baking and this is a quick post to share some of the things I have been doing.

A couple of weeks back I attended a friends Girls Night in held in honour of her co-hosts late mother Eileen and I really wanted to share a couple of photo's. These ladies raised just under $2,000 to donate to the National Breast Cancer Foundation. It was superbly organised with raffles, a dessert table, auctions and more, many local business were so generous in donating goods and services.  I made some macarons (of course) some decorated sugar cookies and triple choc cookies. I had a great time, met some lovely people and even won the lucky door prize (wahoo), thanks so much to the organisers for such a great night.

As well as the girls night in, this past weekend I made up a couple of batches of cupcakes and decorated cookies for my Aunty who participated in the relay for life in her bid to raise awareness and funding for Lynch Syndrome, she and her supporters did a great job as well.

and you all know it was Halloween, well was baking up a Halloween storm, orange macarons for the neighbors, Halloween cake pops and more. In fact I entered the Little Betsy Baker Halloween pop competition and was lucky enough to win the facebook fan vote with my Betsy Witchy Poo pops pictured above.

Then I made up a batch of rainbow lollipop cookies for Faye at Giggles and Tantrums for a photoshoot, yup their the ones at the top of this post, those cookies always brighten up my day.


And created some new lollipop cake pops pictured below.......tutorial on how to make these will hopefully be up within a week.

oh and some cupcakes and fondant toppers for Ah Tissue fabulous new product shoot which will get their own posting in a couple of days.

Phew, and a bit more in between all of this ....busy busy busy.

Ladybeetle love bug cupcake toppers

OK, I'm totally in love with these little lady beetle love bugs I made today. Ever since I saw them in a new book I bought I've just been itching to try them out.

Now I'm not the best with figurines but the ones in the pics were my first attempt using the easy instructions in Debbie Brown's new Gorgeous and Gruesome cakes for Children.

Who wouldn't love this little fella and his misshapen eye...


and I thought I would try my hand at making the concept into a bee, it needs a bit of work but those lady beetles love, love, love them.

I used the instructions in the new Gorgeous and Gruesome cakes for Children by Debbie Brown...mostly.... just a little tweaking, Debbie's look way cuter of course, but I did replace the little feelers with fondant just because I have little kids and I like everything to be edible where possible.



Gorgeous and Gruesome Cakes for Children

Sorry my posts have been a bit sparse lately, I have been a little bit busy with real life. But don't worry soon I promise I'll have a tutorial for these super cute and super sweet Bubble and Sweet original Lollipop Cake Pops I made last week.

Triple Chocolate Cookie recipe - my fav chocolate cookie eva

Well today was supposed to be a Daring Bakers Challenge post, but that's not happening.

Instead I'm going to share the recipe for those rich looking cookies from Robert's birthday party, my favourite Triple Chocolate Cookie recipe.


It's based on an old Family Circle recipe with a little tweaking. Make sure you use Large eggs, not Extra Large as it will make a difference.

Try to use nice quality chocolate and cocoa I used a good Belgium brand, but whatever you like eating will probably work.

Sometimes I replace some of the dark choc chips with Macadamia nuts and they become oh so yummy triple chocolate macadamia cookies.

However you make them I hope you enjoy them they have been a favourite of mine for years.

Triple Chocolate Cookies - makes about 25 large cookies

1   1/2 cups plain (all purpose) flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1   1/2 cups soft brown sugar
180g (6 and 3/8 ounce) unsalted butter
150g  (5 1/4 ounce) dark chocolate, chopped
3 large eggs lightly beaten
3/4 cup dark choc chips
3/4 cup white choc chips

Preheat oven to 180 C (375 F), line a couple of trays with baking paper.

Sift flour, cocoa and brown sugar into a mixing bowl.

Combine butter and chocolate in a bowl and melt in microwave on short bursts at med/low mixing well between each session.

Add butter mixture and eggs to dry ingredients and mix until combined, do not overbeat.

Stir in choc bits.

Drop about 2 tablespoon for each cookie onto tray, flatten slightly and bake for 12 mins.

Cool for 5 mins before transferring to a wire rack to cool.

Pink Ribbon Chocolate Dipped Macaron Pops for Pinktober

This month for Pinktober the online macaron group mac attack decided to do Pinkarons, which I have to say wasn't much of a challenge for me because I'm such a girly girl I make pink macarons at least once a month.

In Australia, the National Breast Cancer Foundation symbol is a pink ribbon, and women across the nation are having "A Girls Night In".

So instead of cheating and using pics I already had, I decided to create a macaron that would be perfect for a girls night in swish soiree with your family and friends.

Pink Ribbon white chocolate dipped macarons on a pop.

Didn't wait long enough before taking this bit, the choc was not quite set but it was oh so delicious

I've been a naughty blogger lately and haven't been taking many pictures of the process so I'll just have to give you some steps.

1. Make your macarons - this is my favorite recipe: Pink Macarons

2. Make your ganache  the recipe is included in the above link for macarons.


3. At the filling stage pop in a Wilton 6" lollipop stick or some other food safe type pop/stick

4. Stick in fridge to set

5. Make pink ribbons by rolling out fondant with a small rolling pin and cutting thin strips with a clean pizza cutter, you can use a knife if you like but the pizza cutter is super easy and leaves as mooth edge. Shape into ribbons.

6. Melt white chocolate with a little copha (copha is a white hard vegetable shortening, like crisco but harder you could substitute a little less crisco), around 15g copha to 120g chocolate or so.

7. Carefully dip macaron pops into chocolate.

8. Allow extra chocolate to drip off whilst holding upside down, shake a little, when you think all the excess has dripped off keep on waiting, there will be more.

9. Pop into styrofoam or similar stand upright to allow to dry, just before the chocolate is set pop the fondant ribbon onto the front of the macaron pop.

If you like you can omit the pink fondant ribbon and just do a plain pop tied with a pink ribbon like these ones below.

Swish and Delish what more could you ask for?


Anyway I can't wait for later in the month for the full line up of the  Mac Attack #12 Pinkarons,


there have been some cute and funny posts so far, they're a fun baking bunch, yup Lora especially you.