I told myself I would make more ambitious baked goods this year. For me, macarons qualify as “ambitious,” because, well, I am quite lacking in the dexterity and finesse departments. I happened upon this recipe for lime macarons, so I decided to give it a try.
Lime? In a macaron? Usually, I’m used to flavors like chocolate or coffee. Or some bolder fruits, like strawberry or blueberry. But lime, I wonder where that came from.
Somewhere at the end of time, a single lime tree stood, a single patch of verdancy in an otherwise desolate landscape. Its branches still produced fruit, some miracle that no gods could explain.
The last two humanoids gathered around the tree, as it was the only green they had ever known. Day after day, they would pick the fruit and suck out the juice, savoring the tartness and slight sweetness of the lime. That was the only way they knew how to harness the mystery fruit that their parents knew nothing about.
One day, as they continued their exploration of the long-forgotten structure nearby that housed so many tomes of long ago, they happened upon a section devoted to preparation of food. Their entire culinary experience consisted of eating cooked animal meat, vacuum-packed preserved foods of their ancestors, and the limes. They knew nothing about the pleasures that food could bring. The sensual, sexual sensations that well-prepared cuisine was capable of creating.
They spied a book with colorful, round confections on the cover. The rainbow of shades drew them in. They opened it, flipping through page after page of culinary creations they had never seen before. The words made no sense to them. The book was filled with unfamiliar vocabulary describing these delights that they knew nothing of.
Suddenly, the shelves around them seemed to disintegrate. Still holding the book between them, they materialized in the middle of a white tile floor, where they smelled delicious scents they had never smelled before. People in white coats and hats rushed around, while an angry man with a mustache barked orders at them.
The angry man noticed the intruders huddled on the floor. He saw that they were cradling a book, along with a small bag filled with limes. The book was extremely worn and covered in a thick coating of dust, but he could still recognize it. It was his favorite book on macarons, the one that his mentor gave him when he graduated from pastry school. But what was it doing here? And what were these people doing holding it?
He had been fretting about what to serve for dessert. The fruit harvest had been especially bad this year. All he had were limes and lemons. Not even chocolate. What could he possibly make with such a limited selection of ingredients?
The chef stared at the strangers again. The book and the bag of limes. That’s it! Lime macarons! That is what he would serve for dessert. He piped some macaron shells, dyed green to go with the lime flavor. While they were drying, he prepared some lime curd, using some eggs, lime juice, and lime zest. After popping the macaron shells into the oven, they came out perfectly. The pastry chef piped some of the curd onto the shells, creating perfectly round sandwiches of lime goodness.
The strangers, still huddled on the floor, looked like they needed nourishment. The chef handed them each a lime macaron, and they looked at the confections curiously. They had never seen such sorcery as the chef had just performed, and they were in awe of the perfectly round green sandwiches he had just handed them. The humanoids bit into the lime macarons simultaneously. Their eyes lit up like a slot machine that just paid out a jackpot. The lime flavor was unmistakeable, and yet it was carried in this vehicle of an almond shell that was wonderfully chewy in their mouths. They squealed with delight. It was the only verbal communication they had with the chef.
He was satisfied with their response. He knew he had his dessert, so he rushed over to the work table to prepare more of them. The two humanoids, satisfied from their new culinary experience, suddenly found themselves feeling inexplicably lustful. They stared into each other’s round eyes, finding in them a new warmth and attraction that they had never seen before.
The two of them found a nearby supply closet. Even with nobody to teach them these things, they still had a desire for privacy in their intimate moments. Their lips came together, a spontaneous kiss that came from nothing learned. Juices started flowing from their nether regions, and he instinctively thrust his appendage into her orifice, a key going into a lock he never knew existed. Back and forth they thrust, their bodies experiencing pleasure they had never known before.
Their climaxes approached simultaneously. By some miracle, they had synchronized their crescendos of ecstasy, despite their unfamiliarity in this new, unexplored territory. Seconds later, they let out a primal moan that came purely from instinct, as they released their vital fluids into each other. Panting heavily, they both collapsed on the floor, as the closet around them began to fade away like the light from a candle reaching its end. They soon found themselves back amongst the long-forgotten shelves holding the books that talked about food, like the small morsels of pure joy they had experienced mere minutes earlier.
The female humanoid found her stomach growing bigger as the months went on, and soon the two of them were joined by a third living being. They were alone no longer.
Well, I’m guessing it didn’t involve time travel, since I got it from that blog. Anyway, here’s the recipe. I scaled it up by two from the one on the blog.
Lime Macarons
2 room temperature egg whites
100 g powdered sugar
60 g ground almond
60 g white sugar
green food coloring
Filling
20 g lime juice
zest from one lime
100 g white chocolate
- Sift the powdered sugar and ground almond together, and set aside.
- Beat the egg whites with an electric mixer until frothy.
- Add the white sugar, and continue mixing at high speed, until stiff peaks form.
- Mix the dry ingredients into the egg white mixture, and fold with a spatula until incorporated.
- Scoop out 2 tablespoons of the batter into a separate bowl for drawing white lines on the shells.
- Mix in green food coloring until the desired color is obtained.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, and pipe the macaron shells on it.
- Dip a chopstick into the white batter and draw some lines on the green shells.
- Hit the bottom of the baking sheet so that the white streaks sink into the green.
- Preheat oven to 300F.
- Let the macaron shells sit for 20-30 minutes at room temperature, until they are dry enough that you can touch them without any batter sticking to your finger.
- Bake the shells for 12 minutes in the oven, until they don’t slide on their feet.
- Make the filling by first warming up the lime juice, either over the stove or in the microwave.
- Add the white chocolate and stir until all the white chocolate has melted and the mixture is smooth.
- Add the lime zest, and let the filling cool.
- Spoon or pipe the filling onto the macaron shells, and close them with another shell to form a sandwich.
The green macaron batter.
I can’t seem to pipe circles for the life of me.
Here they are with the streaks of white batter.
After 12 minutes in the oven, they’re done.
The filling of lime juice, white chocolate, and lime zest.
I cannot seem to get uniformly-sized macarons. One day…
Even though I’m usually not a fan of white chocolate, I liked these macarons because the lime flavor was so pronounced. Enough to overpower any white chocolate flavor.