Elsa and Olaf Macarons with Whipped Earl Grey White Chocolate Ganache

I had a last minute request for Elsa and Olaf macarons from my friend that just managed to squeeze in the night before my planned macaron mania. For those of you who know how I work, I usually work on a couple to a few orders at the same time when I plan to bake macaron shells (although decoration and assembly work take place at different times).  Sometimes I am able to accomodate last minute requests to ride on existing planned bake if the requested quantity is small. The good news is some people are happy that they managed to place an order. The not so good news is it's quite a rush job to plan for the unplanned. Because of that, sometimes I make boo-boos while baking and it happened here. Thankfully it still turned out well thanks to the forgiving nature of Italian method. I shall tell you what happened during the process and it may convince you to switch from French to Italian :p.

Looking at these, you won't suspect that I made a booboo! I made Elsa and Olaf macarons at the same time as the elephants and Minnie Mouse ribbons.

I used the reduced sugar macaron shell recipe for these but you may use the regular recipe without sugar reduction too. Please refer to my Creative Baking: Macarons book and video tutorials for the basics and piping of complex shapes. Just to share the piping process...

First I piped the base with a fairly large-tipped piping tip (6-7mm diameter). Bang tray on table to release trapped air.

Let the base shells partially dry before piping on the pop-up features. Waiting time can be anywhere from 15-30 minutes. Use your finger as a gauge instead of drying time. The shells should feel sticky but the batter should not stick to your finger. Pipe the hair and hands of Olaf with a 2mm piping tip. Add on his snout using a 4-5mm tip and use a toothpick to pull the batter in place. Pipe Elsa's nose and ears with a 2mm piping tip. Pipe alternate segments of her hair with a 3mm piping tip and use a toothpick wherever necessary. Pipe the base shell of Elsa with 6-7mm tip. Remember to bang the tray again.

After piping the above tray, I happily used up ALL the yellow batter for the yellow elephants. I looked at the Elsa and Olaf tray again and slapped my forehead. With no more yellow batter left in the piping bag but an extra elephant piped, I had no choice but to use a small spatula to scoop up some yellow batter on the baking tray from one elephant and the base shells of the Elsas and put it back into the piping bag. I re-piped the base shells and added on the extra bits of hair on Elsa.

Finally piped finished!

Let the shells dry. Bake at preheated oven for 10 minutes for 140°C at lowest rack, followed by 130°C for 7-8 minutes. If the feet still appear wet, reduce temperature to 110-120°C and bake for another 5 minutes or until feet appear dry.

Freshly baked shells!

I used royal icing to add in the features and a little black gel dissolved in vodka to make a grey paint to highlight the pop up features. This highlight is subtle and serves to accentuate the pop-up features like Elsa's hair and Olaf's snout. Fine black edible marker was used for Elsa's eyebrows. A little dusky pink lustre dust was used for the eyeshadow and peach lustre dust for the cheeks. Elsa's crown was piped on a baking sheet with the crown template underneath, oven dried before transferring onto her head.

I filled the shells with whipped Earl Grey white chocolate ganache as requested.



With love,
Phay Shing