Chocolate Passionfruit Macarons

These are my must have flavour when visiting Pierre Herme or Laduree overseas for macarons, so I was surprised to hear Kerry Vincent declare on the Great Australian Bake Off that the two flavours don't 'go' well together! You do need to be careful to use the right chocolate though - too dark and you'll overpower the passionfruit, and if its not dark enough it will be too sweet.

The recipe I use is based on Pierre Herme's recipe which requires fresh passionfruit, juiced. The trick to getting lots of juice out of passionfruit is to blitz the pulp first then strain it. Another option is to buy frozen passion fruit juice (Boiron) but this can be quite costly.

For the shells

110g ground almonds

200g icing sugar

50g caster sugar

90g egg whites

food colouring - yellow and red

Whisk egg white to stiff peaks, gradually adding the caster sugar. Add colouring to achieve intensity you desire - I use yellow and a touch of red colouring.

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

Pipe rounds onto baking trays and leave until a skin forms (usually at least 30 mins, much longer if humidity is high).

You can dust these with unsweetened cocoa powder if you like, or leave them plain.

For the passionfruit ganache

100g passionfruit juice (around 5-6 passionfruit)
40g good quality unsalted butter
140g milk chocolate (~40% cacao)

Heat passionfruit juice to around 60 degrees Celsius and put aside.
Melt chocolate and butter and add the passionfruit juice, whisking until completely combined.

This ganache takes longer to set than most and is best left in the fridge overnight.