Strangely enough, the past couple of days have – unlike the thousands that came before – felt soothing.

Almost like a slow motion picture.

In fact, this has sort of become a common fact. Every day spent in Entrevaux – a small village surrounded by mountains, and where wearing a Peruvian hat makes it to the local news (well, gossips) for at least a fortnight – seems to last forever.

Definitely a good thing in my book. Especially since Guillaume and I booked our plane tickets to a new life.

On the 7th of November, we’ll be landing in London, scouting for the cutest little flat, and more importantly to the sweetest little jobs as pastry cooks. Any hints are more than welcome!

A one-way ticket. And a promise of busy days ahead. Come what may.

Somehow, the Concorde seemed fit for the occasion. Even though I suspect its name comes from the Parisian place de la Concorde, I can’t help but remember that express Paris to NYC flight.

New and exiting. Just how I feel right now.

Concorde
Adapted from Pierre Hermé.

This entremet might be: 1. from Pierre Hermé, and 2. pretty delicious, it’s nonetheless very easy to make. Picture a simple chocolate mousse sandwiched between crisp yet soft (due to the freezing) chocolate meringue disks.

Then comes the montage [assembling], which requires special care so you have a smooth entremet, reading for glazing. The secret lies in gently pressing down the disks of meringue into the mousse before piping some more mousse, just so that the mousse coats the edges of the disks and don’t form any air bubbles.

I checked on the daring bakers’ recipe quite late this month, thinking I would have to miss out on this one (yet again) given how tired I felt.

However, things turn out to be a little different. Far from what I expected them to be. As I opened the forum thread, I was thrilled by Meeta and Tony’s pick.

But I mean, who wouldn’t?

1. It’s from Pierre Hermé. Yes, this is totally the point where I blabber about how I loved working him, getting to make all the pâtisseries he sells in his shops, blah, blah, blah. Someone, please stop me. I love him. Period.

2. It has chocolate. Lots of it.

3. It’s made from pâte à choux: perhaps my most favourite thing in the entire world (if you put my consistent inability to produce nice looking choux puffs aside).

And if that didn’t convince you, I’ll have to force the following into your minds. How could you not love something that oozes chocolate crème pâtissière everytime you sink your teeth in it?

I knew it, you’re sold. So was I.

The experiment
- golden choux encasing
- the most luscious chocolate crème pâtissière
- and iced with a simple chocolate fondant

The pâte à choux is a basic. Flour is cooked into a smooth mass with water, milk and butter. First, the butter is cut into small even-sized cubes that are thrown into a pan along with water and milk, and a little salt and sugar. Both the milk and butter make for soft and golden-coloured choux. Indeed, milk is the perfect ingredient to enhance the Maillard reaction that naturally occurs between amino acids and reducing sugars. Heat milk proteins and lactose together and the magic will take place: deep brown colour, and lovely caramel and smoky aromas.

Anyway, this mixture is slowly brought to the boil. And as soon as the butter has melted, flour gets incorporated off the heat in one go, and beaten until it forms a smooth dough.

Then, the pan is placed back over medium heat. The dough is beaten vigorously with a wooden spoon to get rid of excess moisture, and also slightly denaturate the proteins behind gluten – glutenins and gliadins. This prevents the gluten from forming too strong a network, and thus, enables the development of the choux in the oven.

Once the flour mass is ready, I moved it into a pyrex bowl and added the eggs, one at a time; beating well after each addition.
For me, four 60g eggs were enough to get a thick yet soft dough. It should hold its shape but be pipe-able as well.

Since I don’t have my piping tools here, I used a Ziploc bag, but as you can see from the not so perfect choux above and below, well, I didn’t do a good job. The thing is, if you want to get nice even choux, you must pipe from above, not pressing the piping tip against the baking sheet (in comparison with how macarons are piped). Well, do this, unless you want multi-air-pocket-choux.

The dough will most likely form peaks which you can press down using your wet fingers. Next step is the baking: preheat the oven to 200°C, but reduce it to 180°C as soon as you place the baking sheet into the oven. As you do so, sprinkle water over the little balls of dough, then close the oven door and do not open it before the choux have risen well – approximately, 10 minutes later.

At this point, you want to open the door slightly and keep it that way. Given that I suppose you have other things to do than staying close to the oven maintaining that door opened, I suggest you stick a wooden spoon in there. It does a magnificent job at it.

Now, you should bake the choux for 10 more minutes or until golden-brown, and dry and firm to the touch.
Take out from the oven, and quickly pierce the bottom of each choux using a pointy knife to help the steam escape and not making those choux all gooey inside. Allow to cool then store in an airtight container.

The crème pâtissière is pretty classic too. Except for the extra-chocolate. You start by making a simple crème pâtissière: bring the milk to the boil, then temper the egg yolks, sugar and starch mixture. Place back into the pan and cook to 84°C.
This crème is then transferred into a container, and chocolate is incorporated. When it reaches 60°C, a little butter gets mixed in for extra smoothness and thickness.
Cover with cling film, making sure the film is right onto the crème – filmé au contact, as we say in France; and refrigerate.

To pipe the crème pâtissière into the choux, simply fill a piping bag fitted with a fine noozle and use the hole previously made to fill in the choux.
Chill while you get on with the fondant.

For this, I forgot Pierre’s recipe and went with a very simple fondant: warm milk, icing sugar and cocoa powder, mixed into a smooth and thick paste.
Then it’s all very easy. Dip the choux, allow the excess fondant to drip and arrange the choux onto a serving plate. Refrigerate for at least 20 minutes.

Soooo…
What if I say that the crème pâtissière was out of this world? Thick and luscious, with the most delicious chocolate flavour.

Anyway, I’m quite happy with how this all turned out. I’ve now officially conquered my choux-fears; not that they look perfect. But at least, I know why they look this way – read multi-air-pocketed. It also made me realise I’m not that bad at making choux. I mean, when I look at my second attempt, they somewhat look goo to me.

Ok, so enough digressing. Back to those chocolate choux, I’m pretty sure I’ll make them again, but this is something I knew even before I started making them. Now the next step is to top the unbaked choux with what French call craquant: a dough make of sugar, flour and butter; rolled very thinly, that gives the choux a lovely crackly look.

You see those cute little guys above. Don’t underestimate them.

Oh no, don’t.

Sure, they do look nice. So plump and golden, you could almost tell right away how crisp and brittle their beautifully thin crust is.
And they certainly do taste good as well. Imagine fragile layers of fine pastry made sticky with oodles of sucre semoule [caster sugar] and beurre doux [unsalted butter]. These are probably what your next dream will be built around, which I would understand. More than you think I would.

But gosh, they gave me a hard time back when I was an intern at Pierre Hermé’s patisserie.

It’s not their détrempe – the mix of flour, butter, fresh yeast, water and salt. Although, I must admit that carrying 25kg bags of flour or emptying the mixing bowl, which I could fit into, wasn’t as funny as it may sound.

It’s not even the tourage, during which you enclose some delicious unsalted butter into the prepared détrempe and fold. Trois tours simples. Folding in caster sugar as you do so, but only for the last tour. It is, without a doubt, a lengthy process – with three resting times in the fridge since the last thing you want is the butter to start melting, the yeast to wake up, the gluten to develop, but an relaxing one.

Here it comes: the façonnage [shaping], the all-time feared step. Guilhem, who was then chef de poste at the tour, should be blessed. He patiently kept showing me how to fold little squares of the elegantly layered dough flecked with jewel-look-alike grains of sugars into neat folded buns.

That just wouldn’t work for me.

Or only very rarely, the only excuse Guilhem could come up with being that my body temperature is just too hot for me to handle buttery doughs. By the time, my squares had been folded into eight, they had that shine. Yes, that shine; which warned me of the upcoming liquefaction the butter was about to undergo.

And quite evidently, they wouldn’t hold their shape and almost always opened like flowers. Pretty pretty, but so not wanted here.

I hear you coming. It must not be that difficult! She’s only exaggerating / incapable (cross out the least appropriate answer). Well, I told you how frustrating those little guys tend to be.
Just try and say their name right.

kouign amann

As most French word, you so not pronounce it the way it is written. That would just be too simple. Remember who – or more extacly – what we’re talking about. Not your usual plain croissant or brioche or even pain au chocolat. No, we’re talking kouign amann here.

koonnee* queen aman-neu, an being French [ɑ̃] as in amande [almond] or grand gâteau [tall cake].
*basically, I’ve always said koonnee and not queenn, but I might possibly be wrong. Thanks Nol for pointing me right!

Obviously, you could also just visit Pierre Hermé’s pâtisserie and buy one – or two – and savour them to the last crumb before you hit the tube or vélib station.

Dans ma bibliothèque
[In my library]I just launched something I’m so very excited about: my own special library, where I share my thoughts on the books I’ve read.
Head over here to find the books I’ve read, those I’m currently reading and those I’m planning to read.
So far, I’ve only written one review, but I promise that many more will come.Oh and yes, I know there are still some tweaking to get done. I can’t seem to include the top navigation abr without problems, which makes the layout look funny on IE. Consider this as an opportunity to get a decent web browser!

I would have preferred a guinea pig.
Those were my first words when my mother told me she was pregnant. As an eight year-old single child, the anticipation of having a sister – or even worse, a brother – was a rather dreadful thought.
However, as years went by, I got used to the idea. And today there is hardly anything or anyone I love more than Aïda, the sweetest sister ever. Not even my awesome boyfriend – or more accurately lack of boyfriend-awesomeness (blond guy who works a Kusmi, find me and my number, and call me); not even my Kitchen Aid stand-mixer. Yes, she totally rocks this much.
So basically, when she asked if she could have her own column on foodbeam, we both got somewhat excited. She chose a recipe. From Pierre Hermé – just another evidence of her innate terrific-ness.
Sure, at the exact moment I write this, she’s being plain annoying and makes me wish I would actually have had a guinea pig instead; hopefully, she’ll soon turn back into the great sister she is most of the time :)

Anyway, let’s move on to the sablés. Rich little pieces of butter and chocolate (and quite obviously, flour, sugar and egg white as well). The recipe, which comes from Pierre Hermé’s Mes desserts au chocolat, should make 65 sablés. What we didn’t know is how small they’re supposed to be; clearly we ended with around 30 chunky biscuits.

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Line two baking sheets with baking paper. And get all the ingredients ready:
- 260g flour
- 30g cocoa powder
- 250g unsalted butter, at room temperature
-100g icing sugar
- 3tbsp whipped egg whites (use 2 eggs and spoon out 3tbsp)

You can prepare your piping bag at the same time.

In a large bowl, combine the flour and cocoa powder, until no white or brown streaks remain.

Cream the butter using an electric whisk, until fluffy. It must be very soft, almost cloud like.

Fold in the sugar and a pinch of salt.

Separate two eggs, keeping the white only (save the yolks for another use – pastry cream, yum!).

Whisk the egg whites until frothy. And fold three tablespoons of them into the butter mixture.

Mix in the flour and cocoa powder and stir with a spoon until just incorporated. The dough should be sort of lumpy.

Not too lumpy though. Keep in mind that it’ll be piped.

Fill the prepared piping bag with the dough, pushing down to get rid of the air.

Pipe small Ss (however, Ws would be prettier). And bake in the preheated oven fo 10 to 12 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack. When cool, keep in an airtight box for up to one week.

That time of the year – yes, the one that brings peace and happiness has come around again. And while Christmas and all its festiveness is already behind us, I can’t help but share with you the lovely bûche de Noël my sister and I made for our Christmas Eve dinner and – it goes without saying – the story behind it.

Isn’t this season supposed to be about love and joyfulness? Well, come to my house and you’re likely to find us fighting. No love. No joyfulness.
Please, do not worry; we’re only discussing which flavour the bûche should be.
However, this year was a totally different matter. No screams were to be heard. No tears to be seen. When I suggested a Plaisirs Sucrés bûche - Pierre Hermé’s signature flavour – everyone seemed to agree and instantly felt relieved to avoid the usually exhausting brawl. A real Christmas-like house.

My sister even helped me out with the dinner. We spent the two days before Christmas cooking, but every second was worth it.
I was so proud of Aïda as she made the fresh yeast blinis all by herself; and she showed a great interest in the bûche making process. She even asked me if she could have her own column in foodbeam. You bet I said yes.

Bûche de Noël Plaisirs Sucrés
Adapted from Pierre Hermé’s PH10 and Thuriès Magazine (Nov. 07)

It’s no secret that Pierre Hermé’s Plaisirs Sucrés is one of my favourite things on Earth. And I feel like everyone would like it, even those who don’t like milk chocolate.
As a milk chocolate supporter, I am more than pleased to have finally found a dessert that truly gives milk chocolate the credit it deserves.

I’m not going to lie to you, this bûche is quite time-consuming to make, but if you’re act methodically your bûche will be ready to be eaten on time.

You should start on the day before you plan to serve it by:
1. the milk chocolate ganache
2. the milk chocolate chantilly
3. the dacquoise aux noisettes
4. the praline feuilleté
5. the fines feuilles de chocolat au lait
6. the joconde
Basically, the entire bûche is made on that day. It is then frozen overnight, at which point it’s ready to be glazed with the miroir chocolat.

Don’t forget to transfer the glazed bûche from the freezer to the fridge two hours before serving.

Note: I mention a 25cm-bûche mould. Please don’t be put off by this if you happen not to own one. I don’t. And if you knew what my so-called bûche mould actually is, you’re likely to burst in laugh.
I asked my dad to cut in half a 10cm-wide plastic pipe – yes, the grey ones, used in the building industry. I encased that half-pipe into one of my 25cm-long loaf pan, covered it with thin cardboard (so that my bûche would be more than 5cm in height) and lined everything with both clingfilm and rhodoïd.
See, my bûche might not look perfect, but well, it went through many things. And I’m sure that everyone can make a great-looking log – even without the appropriate mould!

It’s November 2. I’m behind the window, watching the rain that pours on my grandparents beautiful garden. Every drop that reaches the earth, bounces on the perfectly-red leaves, making a loud noise.
Rain makes me happy. I know I could be playing outdoor, but right now, nothing feels as comforting as being where I am. It’s still pretty early and my grand-mother is preparing the breakfast table while my grand-father has gone to the boulangerie to get une baguette bien cuite for lunch.
Today, I’m turning sept ans et demi [7 1/2]. Et ça c’est important.

As I’m lost in my thoughts, I realise that grand-mère has been calling me for the last couple of seconds. Time for breakfast.
I sit at the table facing my bowl of hot chocolate and a plate full of homemade bread pudding topped with a generous spoonful of yogurt. Both of my grand-parents sip their strong coffee and start spreading butter on their tartines.

Hmmm, ça sent bon. Je peux goûter [Hmmm, it smells lovely. Can I have a sip]?
Oui si tu veux, mais c’est assez fort [Yes sure. It's strong though].
She hands me her brown pyrex cup. Fais attention il est chaud [Watch out, it's hot]. It is indeed. Warm and strong. Baah, c’est amer [Baah, this is bitter].
I decide that coffee is not for me and that I shall never drink some again. I just stick to my sweet and milky hot chocolat chaud. The bread pudding is soft and melts like butter in my mouth. La bouche pleine.
Qu’est ce qu’on va faire aujourd’hui [What are we going to do today]? Rochefort. Youpi!

A couple of hours, after lunch, we all head to Rochefort. The rain is still pouring but jumping in water pools is just too funny. As we reach the place principale, I spot a lovely pâtisserie. In the beautifully decorated window, some bright white balls stand out. Boules de neige.

A little more than 15 years later, those memories feel real again. I am biting into some homemade coconut balls and they took me years behind. Funny how food can act as a time-travel machine.

Coconut balls
Adapted from Dorie Greenspan’s coconut domes.

When I read Dorie’s article on serious eats, I knew I had to try my hands at coconut domes – or more accurately in my case – balls.
Her description of those treats reminded me of the ones I had eaten I Rochefort. The exterior is slightly crunchy, but not browned; while the interior is moist.
The recipe, which originally comes from Pierre Hermé, insists on soaking the coconut into the milk mixture overnight. Please do not skip this step as it ensures soft and chewy bites of sweetness.

Remember the day when I said I would write about my internship at Pierre Hermé’s pâtisserie on a weekly basis? Well, I seem to have forgotten that last part: weekly basis…
I have to admit I’ve been doing really bad. Out of ten terrific weeks, I managed to write two articles. Just two.

I had high hopes though. I intented to tell you about how I got to taste the bûches de Noël and new macarons months before their official release at the palace Crillon. I also meant to write about the awesome two weeks I spent au tour, making doughs, pâtes feuilletées, sucrées et à foncer*.
Oh those two weeks…certainly the best at Pierre Hermé Paris. It is probably where I learnt the most, but my sweetest memory has nothing to do with the techniques Guilhem taught me. Three words: sablés aux olives.
I think I spent hours (and yes, I do mean hours) cutting out 5,5cm-wide disks out of the amazingly smooth yet speckled with crushed black olives dough. The pâte à sablés was so fragrant that as soon as I took it out of the fridge, it filled the room with a strong and delightful olive perfume.
The dough was then rolled, détaillée, arranged into small silicon moulds and baked. Possibly the best cookies I’ve ever had: sweet yet pleasantly salty and perfectly short-textured.

I left Paris with one obsession: making those cookies at home. And so did I. Once, then twice… As you can imagine they quickly became my go-to recipe.

* I promise I’ll try to whip up some posts about those weeks ate Pierre Hermé Paris.

Sablés aux olives noires comme chez Pierre Hermé
Adapted from Pierre Hermé and Julie Andrieu’s Confidences sucrées

I recently bought Pierre Hermé’s new cookbook, co-written with French food writer Julie Andrieu and it appears to be a great book.
Pierre Hermé reveals some of his signature recipes: macarons passion, tarte tango, cake ispahan or sablés aux olives noires; just to name a few.

The recipe for the sablés is the same as the one used at the laboratoire, but is so straightforward that you can easily make it at home.
First, you start by hard-boiling an egg. This might seem weird to you, but you’re only gong to keep the hard yolk, finely grate it and incorporate it into the dough. The use of cooked egg yolk is traditional in Alsace and gives a light and crisp texture.
Then you mix the butter, olive oil and sugar, in which the egg yolk goes. Finally, to rapidly fold in the flour and starch, and crushed black olives.

The key is to mix the dough just until it comes together. Then you have to work fast: roll it and chill overnight. Pierre Hermé suggests refrigerating the dough before rolling it out; but I always find it too hard to roll when too cold; so I chose to roll the dough just after it’s been made, taking care not to overwork it.

At the laboratoire, the sablés are baked in small silicon moulds. Sadly, I don’t have any at home so I went for my muffin tins and it makes wonders. I guess you could also bake them on a lined baking sheet, they just wouldn’t be as regular-looking.

The recipe can easily be halved; just make sure you don’t overwork the dough and you’ll be just fine.

No need to be from France to know that, here, people rave about la tarte au citron meringuée. A sweet and crisp crust covered with the most luscious and so pleasantly tangy lemon cream, which is topped with a smooth and marshmallow-like meringue.
The description might sound heavenly, but I have to confess that lemon meringue tart clearly isn’t a favourite on my list (oh well, at least until I made this one). My sister, on the other end, must be French-er than I am because to her la tarte au citron meringuée simply equals perfection (ok, this and les plaisirs sucrés). If I’d listen to her, I would be making one tart every single day of the week and this, all year long.
I can so picture her, biting into a generous slice, closing her gorgeous eyes and enjoying – what she calls la meilleure chose au monde entier.

While it’s generally not my thing to make pastries I don’t actually like, here, I had to. Honestly. Aïda had been asking for a lemon meringue tart for years, yet, I had never made one.
Picking the recipe was a matter of seconds. Pierre Hermé, again? Well, I have to admit – not without shame – that I love his genuine pastries more than ever, and that if there was just me, I would be making Pierre Hermé’s recipes only. Somehow, foodbeam would no longer be called foodbeam, more like pierrebeam and well, to be honest, it doesn’t sound half as good. Therefore, I might as well stick to my original plans, which were to cook from as many of my cookbooks as possible. Meanwhile (read: as long as Pierre Hermé cookbooks will sit on my shelves), you’ll have to bear with me and my addiction (read: making Pierre Hermé’s gorgeous pastries).

Meilleure tarte au citron meringuée du monde entier
Adapted from Pierre Hermé and Dorie Greenspan’s recipes

This tart simply is the best ever, no less.
The pâte sucrée crust is exactly perfect: buttery, crisp and fragrant with a hint of vanilla. The lemon cream, despite containing 300g butter and 200g sugar doesn’t feel heavy; it’s more like a fluffy and very aromatic and tangy cream. My favourite part is the meringue; which is a melt-in-your-mouth pillow of goodness.

I won’t lie to you: this tart is time-consuming. However, it is totally worth it. Just one bite will instantly reward you.

‘Maman, tu pourrais quand même la faire toi-même; c’est tellement meilleur!’ [Mum, you could make your own; it's so much better!], I said and then what she answered made me realise that some people do see pâtisserie as the very-complicated-and-not-enjoyable part of gastronomy.
‘Oh mais non, la pâte sablée, c’est tellement difficile à faire.’ [Pâte sablée is way too difficult to make.]

I realise that some pastries are time-consuming and require some advanced skills, but pâte sucrée… No way! Once you get the few basic principles, you’ll produce a flawless and consistent (not to mention lick-your-fingers delicious) pâte sucrée.

The few basic principles as said above are:
1. Do not overwork the dough or the gluten will develop and you’ll get a chewy and elastic crust (while, what you want is a crisp one).
2. Do not overwork the dough or the butter will melt and your crust will be greasy.
See, just a few principles to respect and now, you’re ready.

I can’t stress enough on the importance of mise-en-place. Getting all your ingredients ready before actually starting makes you save time and teach you to be organised.
Here you’ll need:
300g unsalted butter, at room temperature
190g icing sugar
60g ground almonds
seeds from 1 vanilla bean
2 eggs
500g flour (ordinary type 55 will do wonders)
1 tsp fleur de sel

Start by creaming the butter until soft and smooth (I use my kitchenaid stand mixer with the paddle attachment just because I’m still excited by the fact that I got one for my birthday, but mixing by hand is just as easy).

Then, mix in the icing sugar, ground almonds and vanilla seeds.

Beat in the eggs, one at a time until fully incorporated.

Remove from the mixer.

Mix in the flour and salt until just incorporated. Do not overwork! The dough should be crumbly, lumpy… Definitely not what you would expect from a French pâtisserie standard.

Form three balls (each weighing approx. 365g) , gently press them down and wrap them tightly in cling film. Refrigerate overnight.
At this step, the pastry can be refrigerated for up to 2 days or it can be frozen for a month (you’ll just need to thaw the pastry in your fridge the day before you want to use it).

Roll the dough between two layers of baking paper. Cut into a disk 5cm larger that your tin (ie. if you’re making mini-tarts and using 8cm cercles, you’ll need to cut your abaisse into a 13cm disk).
Refrigerate the disk for at least 2 hours.

You can now start lining (foncer in French) a buttered cercle à tarte. The butter helps the dough to slide on the sides of the cercle.
I will try to make a video about fonçage so you can see how you need to proceed, as it can be quite tricky sometimes. Basically, you need to pinch the dough between your right finger and push it down using the sides. Keep doing this, until the full cercle is lined and check if the dough forms a 90° angle (if not, push it towards the bottom a little more).
Chill for an hour.

It’s now time to bake the crust. Pre-heat your oven to 175°C.
Take the lined cercle out of the fridge, cover the base and side of the pastry with baking paper and fill with dried beans or rice (baking weighs are to heavy for this fragile pastry).
Bake for 17 to 25 minutes (depending on the size of your crust. Remove the dried beans/rice and baking paper and bake for another 3 to 5 minutes or until nicely coloured.

Can you guess what’s coming next?

I arrived at the Vaugirard shop, well in advance, around 1.30pm to try my best at doing a good first impression.
I did the usual routine – outfit (self-note: I do look hot in my outfit; well I’m just trying to convince myself and eventually that will happen – ok I’m not kidding anyone: this will never happen but you know, one has to make concessions in order to reach one’s dreams), aprons, hand washing, hand-shaking… And then, I entered the macaron universe.

First, we start by making the ganaches and to tell the truth, I was desperate because, by the time I had finished my one and only ganache – Jasmin, all the other team members had already made at least two different batches.
It is now time to sort the baked coques [literally shells, standing for the shell of the macaron] – all the broken ones are put into a bucket, the baking papers are inverted onto racks and the coques are aligned: 12 in the length and 8 in the width. This might sound easy, but it is quite tiring. After a few hours, I felt like I was a macaron-sorting-machine; I couldn’t even tell the differences of size between the different macarons. So weird to see what strange sensations a tired brain can generate!

Then it’s all about the filling and closing. One – or two – pâtissiers pipe the luscious ganaches onto the arranged coques and it’s my job to close them right after the ganache has been piped. Indeed, ganaches tend to solidify quite quickly (except when the oven gets the room so hot that the ganaches are melting – I have a lovely souvenir of a melting olive ganache and me trying to close the macaron; a disaster, I tell you), thus it’s best to close the macarons quickly so the ganache forms a nice little belly. At this point, it was my favourite part. But then came the Ispahan macarons – read: not only you have to close the macaron but you have to place small sticky squares of homemade raspberry gellant (it’s a kind of fruit jelly that relies on agar agar instead of gelatine or pectin as a solidifying agent) on every single coque before you can actually start to close them. The result is beautiful though. Indeed when you bite into the perfectly round and shiny macaron (and gosh knows how much I loooove to do this) you discover a raspberry-ish surprise.

The addition of little hidden things in the hearts of macarons is Pierre Hermé’s signature: olive oil and vanilla (with two pieces of green olive), Ispahan (raspberry gellant), Mosaic (two griotte halves – hint: this is my personal favourite) and white truffle and hazelnuts (three crushed hazelnuts) just to cite a few. This is, in my opinion a wonderful invention – it places Pierre Hermé’s macarons to another level, a level no one can outdo. While I’m talking about what I love about these macarons I have to tell you that the amount of ganache in each macaron is insane (in a good way) and shows that, here, the focus is on flavours.
Well, it seems I’m (slightly and only slighty) starting to digress, so please let’s go back to the récit of my first day.
Basically when we finished closing the last few macarons (out of approximately 6000-8000) it was already 11pm and I thought I was about to go home. I was wrong; yep, totally wrong – time to clean the laboratoire. This was actually quite enjoyable because I got to clean the fridge and the fact that it didn’t feel that cold in it made me realise how hot I was. Who said making macarons wasn’t a sport?
Speaking of sport (and yes I’m digressing again), if macaron throwing was an Olympic discipline, I would be a serious challenger for the gold medal. Indeed, I did throw macarons all the time during this first day and every time it was totally unwanted. I would bump in the echelle [metallic shelves on which you put the racks of sorted macarons] and a couple of coques would fall on the floor. Alternatively, while throwing the not-perfect coques into the buckets I would send them overboard and they would fall on Loïc (who seems to always be in front of me; and no – sorry – I’m not trying to blame someone else!).
So this was my first day and although it is all true (well slightly exaggerated sometimes, but you know I come from the south of France and we do tend to exaggerate things) I was wrong.
Totally wrong!

Quickly, as I became faster and better, I started enjoying it a lot. And the days after the first one were really far from what I had imagined them to be.
I got to make so many different ganaches, close so many macarons and discover the sweetest people ever, that eventually, when it was time for me to say goodbye I almost cried (hint hint – I am exaggerating but the feelings were there). The whole week seemed like it only lasted a minute and gave me the opportunity to learn how to work fast.
Although I can’t say I am the best macaron maker in the world I did notice an improvement – my moves are now quicker and more confident.

So, yes, you understand I had to reward myself for all the hard work. And what’s better that a selection of the current macaron collection. Hmmm ten different pieces of what is probably referred to as ‘heaven on earth’.
Please do not worry for my stomach – I did not eat them all in one day (though three were enough to finish the gorgeous box). By the way, when you buy the macaron they look far more perfect than the ones below but something unexpected happened in the metro – I dropped my Pierre Hermé bag. I know you’re certainly gasping right now: how could she drop the beautiful laced bag? But sadly it happened and the macarons definitely suffered. They were just as good though ;)

Chocolat amer [bitter chocolate]
Chocolate macaron (the batter contains actual chocolate not cocoa powder) with dark chocolate ganache

This is always the first sort we make – I guess it’s because of the ganache. Indeed, given that it is made with 70% chocolate that contains a great part of coca butter, the amer ganache tends to solidify really quickly and thus, we need to use it before it’s too hard to pipe.
Tasting notes: at first, you get the intense chocolate taste which is then balanced by the slight bitterness.

Mogador
Macaron with milk chocolate and passion fruit ganache

Then we make these, also because of the higher coca butter content of the ganache.
Tasting notes: when I first tried it, I was a bit dubious. But then, it quickly became addictive. Now, the Mogador macaron is probably my favourite. The combination of milk chocolate and passion fruit is simply outstanding – I love how the tanginess of the passion fruit enhances the milk chocolate.

Ispahan
Macaron with rose and litchi ganache and squares of raspberry gellant

Tasting notes: I know most of you won’t believe what I am about to say, but I’m not the biggest fan of the rose and litchi ganache. However, I just love this macaron – maybe not as much as the entremet though; I think the acidic touch brought by the raspberry gellant makes for a perfectly balanced macaron.

Arabesque
Macaron (sprinkled with pistachio) with apricot ganache and a square of pistachio praline

The apricot ganache, which is the one I made the most, is thickened with dried apricots and contains no cream – a pure delight. And let me say one word about the pistachio praline – it is out of this world. I could eat the whole box of it.
Tasting notes: apricot and praline might sound like an unusual combination but it works. The ganache is thick and creamy yet sharp and the chocolate part of the praline round up the flavours nicely.

Café fort [strong coffee]
Macaron with strong coffee ganache

Tasting notes: this macaron looks so pretty. I just love the different tones of brown – c’est chic! The flavour is clean and perfectly balanced. A favourite.

Thé au jasmin [jasmine tea]
Macaron with jasmine tea ganache

Tasting notes: this macaron is very floral and has a distinctive jasmine tea taste.

Caramel au beurre sale [salted caramel]
Macaron with salted caramel crème au beurre [buttercream]

Tasting notes: one word – delicious! Just the thought of the rich caramely crème au beurre makes me drool.

Rose
Macaron with rose crème au beurre

Tasting notes: yummy in pink. This macaron is really fragrant and delicate.

Mosaic
Macaron with pistachio and cinnamon ganache, and two griotte halves

Tasting notes: this is one of my favourites. First it looks pretty. Second it tastes fabulous. The ganache is terrific: I love the hint off cinnamon that enhances the warmth of the pistachio flavour. And the griottes (small cherries) add a balancing sourness.

Olive oil et vanille
Macaron with olive oil and vanilla ganache and two pieces of green olive

Tasting notes: I am a big fan of the olive oil and vanilla combination, and I’m sure that if you still have some doubts about it this macaron will convince you. I love the roundness of the ganache – slightly bitter because of the olive oil yet sweet.

Next week: Let’s go back, back to… the morning team!