A few of our favourite things...

Libby: A weekend in Christchurch always means Saturday morning at the Christchurch Farmers' Market. When visiting on the weekend I picked up 1/2 a dozen macarons from J'aime les macarons. My new favourite flavours from their winter flavours is peanut butter and jam, closely followed by Milo - brilliant green shells filled with Milo ganache! You don't have to visit the market to get your hands on some of these beautiful macarons - there are two stores in Christchurch or you can order online.

Miriam: On Saturday Mike and I popped into Galbraith's Alehouse for a wee tipple.  We discovered this Gunnamatta beer by Yeastie Boys on tap.  This beer is a "tea-leafed" India Pale Ale, made with earl grey blue flowers.  I've recently become quite fond of earl grey tea, and this beer helped to further solidify my fondness.  You can really taste the earl grey flavours coming through, and it's so unexpected but yet so good. See if you can hunt this beer out and taste it too!

pretty pink macarons

Forget big brash cupcakes, macarons, the super sweet and oh-so-elegant French treat are the current darling of the baking world. Here in Christchurch I love to buy them from J'aime les macarons, who have well and truly perfected the art of the macaron, but last week I thought it would be fun to try making some myself. Macarons are notoriously tricky to make, the base recipe containing just egg whites, ground almonds and sugar, so I was prepared for a less than perfect result.

And so be it, my first attempt at macarons flopped. I used a Ruth Pretty recipe for chocolate macarons that had been in my 'to-try' folder of newspaper clippings and website printoffs for few years. The mix was very wet, and I think in hindsight I over mixed it too - the amount of folds the batter is given being a critical success factor for perfect macarons; too much air in the mix and they will peak when baking, but too little air makes a flat macaron. Oddly, the recipe instructed to bake the macarons at 200c, which was much hotter than most other recipes I had seen. I baked one tray as per Ruth's instructions and another at 150c, but both produced macarons that were determinedly flat and cracked on the top. When I went to the Ruth Pretty website to check the oven temperature I noticed a photo had been added since I had printed the recipe off, and it didn't bode well, they were very skinny which is never a good look for a macaron. I think this was the first time a Ruth Pretty recipe has failed me, but I should undoubtedly shoulder some of the blame myself too...

My next attempt was the recipe on Mrs Cake's blog. If you are interested in a run down on the more technical but highly interesting aspects of macaron making you should check out her macaron post via the link above. (I being too lazy to go into the detail required, and why reinvent the wheel...) This batch worked well and I was rather pleased with myself. They had lovely smooth shiny tops and the requisite wee 'foot' on the base. Sandwiched together with a bitter chocolate ganache they are tucked in the fridge for when sweet cravings strike. One thing I would suggest is leaving the filled macarons in the fridge for a day or two before eating, before that the shell shatters upon biting and the texture is a bit amiss.

a few of our favourite things...

Becs: March 20th was Macaron Day, as celebrated in France, and now also in Christchurch at J'aime les macarons, where Amanda makes the most perfect macaroons. (The French sort, made from egg whites and ground almonds and filled with ganache, not the coconut biscuits.) In honour of the occasion, the macaroons at their lovely wee shop were all 'on sale' for just $1 each. Anna, Sarah and I lined up to purchase our quota of 12 each. My selection was - blackcurrant, coffee, lemon, mint, pistachio, coconut and the new olive oil and vanilla macaron.

Miriam: After a few drinks celebrating St Patrick’s day at the Claddagh, we were in need of food. We probably should have gone for some traditional Irish cuisine (perhaps corn beef and potatoes), but Hansan Vietnamese Restaurant was nearby so we dined there instead. I had this gigantic pork & prawn pancake, maybe one of the biggest meals you could ever get for $15! As the Vietnamese do, I cut up the pancake, added the accompanying carrot, cucumber and dipping sauce and wrapped it in lettuce leaves. Yum!

Libby: I spent the last few days in Queenstown and visited Patagonia Chocolates while I was there. Not for the chocolate but for the ice cream! It was amazing. I tried the Patagonia dark chocolate (once) and the banana split (twice) and couldn't decide which I liked best. Patagonia also make their own delicious waffle cones which I tried on my first visit - very good but almost a bit too much especially as the end of the cones are filled with chocolate!