le macaron de la nature étrange

The pink painting above is by a very famous almost celebrity painter in the Philipines. His name is Ronald Ventura and his is very talented indeed. He does a lot of etching using black pencils and over the top sculptures as well. That particular pink number sold for US $21,000 last night! Oh goodie oh

My first macaron baking outside of Melbourne did yield a mediocre result, being a perfectionist, I was determined to find a way to break into my oven again (meaning adjusting to a new home oven for the third time in three months). After the fourth batch the macarons turned out pretty good, frilly feet, top shells without the slight burnt and easy to peel bottoms that were cooked almost-perfect. The only downside is that they were still flat compare to my macs I baked in Melbourne chilly weather. Perhaps it was because I didn't refrigerate my egg whites for a week as I was in a hurry to bake 60 macarons for an exhibition at my brother's galerie and just decided that morning that I was going to whip up some hideous magic that somehow I was ready to conquer my oven!

Perhaps from the photos you might think that they look fat and happy macs, but they were still not above my level of satisfaction and although I got rave reviews from everyone, I was sceptical. And not to mention the hideous colours (oops I used the word 'hideous' again)! Surprisingly and well obviously the black sesame were the all time favourite (green) with a tint of green tea. The pink white choc with strawberry flavour using my Lindt white couverture chocs were indeed very nice, a bit sweet but I would definitely used that pink chocolate again. The brown ones were cappuccino caramel and I added tant pour tant (almond and icing sugar mixture) to stabilize the texture. Those were all gone too at the end of the night cos everyone said they loved the chewiness from the almond and caramel bite.

Was having nervous tensions on how to serve my macs, and was searching around my home to see what I could use to create a bit of difference and voila! I nicked my brother's wooden cabinet's shelves, whip them clean and put some tissue for le macaron de la nature étrange. The Strange Nature Macaron...