Strawberries and Cream Macarons

I stumbled upon some freeze dried strawberries a couple of weeks ago and thought they could work well sprinkled on some macaron shells. I thought I'd take the opportunity to see how my oven handles white macaron shells while I was at it - it would seem I need to bake them for significantly longer and at a much lower temperature than usual.

So here they are, for my 100th post, Strawberries and Cream macarons…. Thanks to everyone from around the world who have visited and supported my blog!

For the shells:

110g ground almonds

200g icing sugar
50g caster sugar
90g egg whites
20g freeze dried strawberries

Whisk egg whites to stiff peaks, gradually adding the caster sugar. 

Fold almonds and icing sugar into the eggwhites, "macaroning" until you achieve the correct consistency.

Pulse strawberries in a food processor gently (careful not to over do it or you'll end up with powdered strawberries).

Pipe your macarons and sprinkle with the freeze dried strawberries. Allow to rest until a skin forms. then bake for 15-18 minutes at 110 degrees.

For the filling:
Make a white chocolate ganache by heating 50g of cream and adding 100g white chocolate. Before allowing it to cool completely, swirl through a couple of tablespoons of some good quality strawberry jam.

The strawberries softened a little whilst the sandwiched macarons rested in the fridge for 24 hours, but they were still yummy!