Wednesday, June 15

Coconut Macaroons

I wouldn't call this particular effort a failure in any way, but it did get a little messy towards the end - I think mostly because we didn't completely follow the recipe.  (My ridiculous and time-consuming fastidiousness occasionally pays off...?)

I've been hearing all these things about gluten-free baking lately and when a friend of mine suggested we make coconut macaroons, I got really excited.  Someone suggested we try dipping half of each cookie in melted chocolate, which did not really work because the cookies hadn't cooled completely and therefore had not set.  So we ended up having bits of the macaroons floating in a giant bowl of melted chocolate.  We managed to deal with that though.

coconut macaroons with an
enormous dollop of melted chocolate

Coconut Macaroons
adapted 500 Cookies

2 cups shredded or flaked coconut
4 egg whites
3/4 cup superfine sugar
2 tsp vanilla
pinch of salt

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
Combine all the ingredients except the cherries in a heat-proof bowl.  Put the bowl over a pan of simmering water and stir constantly for about 6 minutes or until the egg whites start to thicken (and the batter holds its form and the consistency is the same throughout).
Remove the bowl from the pan, add the cherries, and crop large spoonfuls on the baking sheets.  Bake for 15 minutes or until the macaroons are golden.
Slide the parchment papers onto a wire wrack and allow to cool completely.

coconut globules

this was our problem...
the egg whites were not thick enough so they seeped out

Timo working hard at scraping those cookies

The Tony awards took place the other night.  It was strange and exciting to watch this award ceremony that included all these amazing shows and performers that I saw a month ago.  On the other hand, I was incredibly frustrated because there are still so many shows that I did not have time to see during finals.  So here's a song from Jersey Boys, my first Broadway show even if it was not part of the Tony Awards. It is a song by Frankie Valli and The Four Season called "Beggin'":


Vanstone, Philippa.  500 Cookies: the Only Cookie Compendium You'll Ever Need.  Portland, Me.: Ronnie Sellers Productions, 2005.  Print.

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