Our Cookbook

French

Passionfruit Raspberry Macaron Cake

Macaron cake with passionfruit cream and fresh raspberries

  • Yield12 Macaron cakes, or 30 macarons
  • Prep6h
  • Cook15m
  • Effortproject

Passionfruit cream

  • 375g milk
  • 375g Passionfruit juice
  • 1 vanilla pod
  • 230g egg yolks
  • 150g granulated sugar
  • 60g corn flour (not starch)
  • 300g butter

Macaron

  • 165g egg white
  • 450g sugar
  • 150g water
  • 165g egg white (yes, two batches, not a typo)
  • 450g almond powder
  • 450g icing sugar
  • food colouring – paste or powder not drops

Method

Passionfruit cream

  1. Add vanilla pod (cut & scraped) to the milk and infuse for at least 30 minutes.
  2. Bring the milk, passionfruit juice, and vanilla pod to the boil. Don’t worry if it splits, it will come back together in the next step.
  3. Mix the egg yolk, sugar, and corn flour together.
  4. Pour 1/3 of the milk into the egg yolk mix, then add everything back into the pan.
  5. Bring to the boil & simmer for 2 minutes, continuously stirring.
  6. Spread thinly on a large sheet pan or dish that will fit in the fridge and cover with cling film (touching the cream).
  7. Leave to cool until <40℃ (around 10 minutes), then refrigerate until needed.

Macaron

  1. Add the water, then sugar to a pan, and heat to 120℃. Start the next step when the sugar hits 110℃.
  2. When the sugar hits 110℃ whip the egg whites to soft peaks (erring on the side of underwhipped).
  3. When the sugar reaches 120℃ pour it medium-slow into the whipped egg white and carry on whipping until cool.
  4. Blitz the almond powder and icing sugar in a food processor to make as fine as possible.
  5. Add the second batch of egg white and any colouring.
  6. Fold the meringue into the dough in batches until mixed. Stop here for the cake, but for small macarons keep mixing until it forms a “v” hanging from a spatula (like choux pastry).
  7. Pipe 10cm circles onto baking mats (silicone or fibreglass) using a spiral motion.
  8. Bake at 165℃ for 20 minutes, then leave until completely cooled.

Combining to a cake

  1. Soften the butter to mayonnaise consistency (really, loosen it up). Ensure there are no lumps. Any lumps at this stage will make it all the way through the to the finished product.
  2. Add the cold passionfruit cream to the butter rapidly, then whip until light – start the mixer on slow to incorporate then full speed!
  3. Place ~6 raspberries around the outside edge of the upturned bottom macaron.
  4. Pipe the whipped passionfruit cream between the raspberries from the centre of the macaron.
  5. Add a raspberry to the centre of the macaron, then pipe more cream over the top (coming slightly above the top of the raspberries).
  6. Place the macaron top on, then top by sticking a single raspberry with the cream.
  7. Leave in the fridge overnight (don’t eat immediately).

Notes

The yield is a guess – we expect to be able to make 12 cakes and have left-over for macarons or extra cakes. Once we’ve made it again we can update here.

Safety

Always have a large bowl of water next to the stove when working with boiling sugar, both to dunk a burn in and to place used utensils and thermometers so they don’t stick.

Ingredients & equipment

  • Henley Bridge is the best place to get the passionfruit juice (frozen), as well as purees, chocolate, pectin, and other specialist baking ingredients.

  • Home Chocolate Factory is a good place to get piping bags, scrapers, thermometers, and chocolate moulds.

  • UHT full-fat milk can be preferable because it’s more neutral flavour.

  • Use frozen passionfruit & mango juices. These are frozen at source so much higher yield and quality than juicing fresh fruit in the UK.

  • Jam thermometers are preferable to digital ones for sugar work because the steam can affect digital readings more.

The cream

The cream is based on a creme patissiere, but swapping 1/2 the milk for passionfruit juice. Ultimately becomes a creme mousseline.

Swapping out passionfruit

The sweetness and acidity needs to be balanced, so starting points are:

  • Lime juice: 120% sugar
  • Blackcurrent: 70% sugar
  • Strawberry: 50% sugar

They’re just a guide – the sweetness of each fruit will make a difference.

Macaron piping technique

For the large macarons pipe from the centre in a spiral, holding the piping back a couple of centimetres above the mat.

For the smaller macarons, hold the piping bag nozzle close to the mat, squeeze without moving, then cut quickly to the side. This can be done rapidly.

Softening butter

Soften butter way more than you think. It shouldn’t melt, but should be very gloopy, like mayonnaise.

Eggs

Weigh eggs rather than counting them, to be precise.

  • 20g ~= 1 yolk yolk
  • 30g ~= 1 egg white

Cooking times & temperatures

All ovens differ, so to get the perfect cook alter the temperature not the time. Adjusting by 5-10℃ (max) will tweak to the desired output.

The cooking time is for the 10cm macaron cake. Reduce the time for macarons.

The resulting macaron should be firm on top and soft on the bottom (and inside).

Leaving overnight

Although they can be eaten immediately, they’re much better left overnight. This allows the moisture from the cream to soften the macaron so it can be eaten with a spoon.

Storage

These can be kept in the fridge for up to 3 days.