Giant Strawberry Macaron Cake
This amazing recipe teaches you how to make a giant strawberry macaron cake filled with homemade strawberry jam and cream cheese filling. This could be the most detailed giant macaron recipe you are able to find online so far! Plus a step-by-step video instructions.
Equipment
- Kitchen scale
- hand mixer
- baking sheet and baking mat
- piping bag and piping tip
- Food thermometer
- oven
Ingredients
For giant macarons
- 100 g almond flour
- 100 g powdered sugar
- 74 g egg white (to be separate into 37g and 37g)
- 100 g granulated sugar (to be separate into 15g and 85g)
- 24 g water
- ¼ tsp red gel food coloring (optional)
For the macaron cake filling
- 30 g strawberry jam
- 60 g cream cheese
- 30 g unsalted butter
- 5 g freeze-dried strawberry powder (optional)
- 30 g heavy whipping cream
- 4 fresh strawberries
Instructions
To Make Giant Macarons
- Line a large baking sheet with a nonstick baking mat (ideally with a macaron mat). Prepare a piping bag tipped with a round tip (I used tip 2A). Put a clip near the tip side of the piping bag, it can prevent the batter from leaking out when you fill the piping bag.
- Add sifted almond flour (see Note 1) and powdered sugar into a large mixing bowl. Whisk until they are well mixed. Add 37g egg white to the mixture, mix until well combined. Set aside.
- Add 85g granulated sugar and 24g water in a small pot, cook over medium heat with a food thermometer inserted to the water. Preset the food thermometer to 117°C/242°F.
- At the same time, pour the remaining 37g of egg white and 15g granulated sugar to a large mixing bowl, use medium speed of the hand mixer to whip the egg white until stiff peaks form.
- Remove the syrup from the heat once it has reached 242°F. With the hand mixer running on medium-low speed, carefully drizzle the hot syrup over the egg whites. You can pour the hot syrup in a thin continuous stream, or in 6 to 7 times, within 2 minutes. (Make sure you do not pour the hot syrup to the hand mixer beaters or the wall of the bowl.)
- Once all the syrup has been poured in, increase the speed to medium-high, beat for about 3 minutes until the meringue is glossy with stiff peaks formed.
- Transfer ⅓ of the meringue to the almond flour mixture (prepared on step 2), optionally some add some red food coloring. Fold the batter until well combined.
- Transfer the batter to the rest of the meringue. Use a spatula to fold the batter until it reaches ribbon stage - you should be able to write at least two number 8s without the batter breaking.
- Transfer the batter into the prepared piping bag.
- Hold the piping bag vertically about ¼ inch above the baking mat, squeeze until the circle reaches about 5 inch diameter. Stop squeezing and flick away the piping tip in a circular motion. With the given ingredients, you should be able to pipe two large macaron disks.
- Hold the baking sheet with one hand, use the other hand to tap the bottom of the baking sheet for a couple of times to release air bubbles. Use a toothpick to pop any remaining air bubbles on the surface.
- Preheat the oven to 300 °F/150 °C.
- Rest the macarons under room temperature for 30 minutes, allowing a thin shell to form on the surface. The macarons should feel dry to touch before being sent into the oven.
- 30 minutes later, reduce the oven temperature to 290 °F/143 °C. Bake the giant macarons on the lower middle rack of the oven at 290 °F for 35 to 40 minutes.
- Remove from oven and let the macarons cool on the baking mat for at least 2 hours (ideally over night). Make sure that they are completely cooled before removing them from the mat, otherwise the bottom might stick to the mat.
To Make Macaron Cake Filling
- In a mixing bowl, use a hand mixer to whip together freeze-dried strawberry powder, room temperature softened butter and cream cheese until creamy. Add heavy whipping cream to the mixture, keep whipping until stiff peaks form, transfer the cream filling into a piping bag tipped with an 8-teeth star tip. (You can substitute the freeze-dried strawberry powder with 1 tbsp of strawberry jam.)
To assemble a macaron cake
- Put one giant macaron shell onto a plate with the flat side facing up. Pipe the cream filling along the outer edge of the macaron.
- Use a spoon to add and spread about 1 tbsp of strawberry jam at the center of the macaron shell. Place a layer of quartered strawberries with the tail pointed toward the center. Gently press a second macaron shell on the top of the filling with the flat side facing down.
- Decorate the top of the macaron cake with some cream filling flowers and strawberries.
- Place the strawberry macaron cake in an airtight container, keep in the fridge overnight before enjoy. Store any leftover macaron cake in the fridge, finish within 2 days.
Video
Notes
Note 1: I used finely sifted almond flour. So I usually don't bother sifting the almond flour.
If your almond flour is not fine enough to pass through a fine mesh sieve strainer, you should use a high-speed blender or a coffee grinder to blend it until it turns fine and powdery.
However, you need to be careful that the almond flour may turn oily as you grind or sift it. It will cause your macarons to be thin and oily. So the best choice would still be using finely sifted almond flour and skip the sifting step.
Note 2:Since macaron shells are ready very sweet, I prefer the filling to be less sweet. So I didn't add any sugar to the cream cheese butter filling. What's more, generally the fruit-to-sugar ratio for traditional strawberry jams is 1:1, which is too sweet to be used as a macaron filling. So I always prefer making my own strawberry jam with a 5:1 fruit-to-sugar ratio.
To easily make this strawberry jam, we add 300g chopped fresh strawberries and 60g granulated sugar to a small pot, stir until well combined. Cook the mixture over medium heat, keep stirring until the amount of the mixture has been reduced to half. You should end up getting about 180g strawberry jam. Transfer the strawberry jam to a bowl, let cool to room temperature, then store in an airtight container the fridge.
If you actually like very sweet macarons, feel free to use store-bought strawberry jam instead.