You guys, I did it. I took our always popular brown butter chocolate chip cookie and turned it into a macaron. Say hello to brown butter chocolate chip macarons!
Have I lost my mind? Maybe. But if I have, I don’t want to find it. Combining two of my favourite treats is maybe one of the best ideas I’ve ever had, and I like to think I’ve had quite a few good ideas. Burger macarons, thin mint macarons, multiple varieties of brown butter chocolate chip cookies. I could go on, but you’re really here for this week’s recipe, so I should probably talk about that.
So, how do we get the taste of our favourite chocolate chip cookie in a little macaron? Let me walk you through it!
First, the shells. We aren’t doing anything outrageous with these, just our typical macaron shell with a little cocoa powder for some extra chocolate taste. The filling is where we’re having all our fun and packing our cookie dough flavour in. You ready? Let’s do this.
Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Frosting
Ok, we’re going to take our cookie dough and turn it into a frosting. First, brown the butter. We need about 3/4 cup for this filling, so start with 1 cup of butter as some of the liquid will evaporate while its browning. We want this to be roughly the consistency of room temperature butter, so let it cool and put it in the fridge until it reaches the right consistency. Next up, we heat our flour. I know we all sneak cookie dough when we’re making it, but as this filling is the focal point of our macarons, we need to heat treat the flour to kill off any bad bacteria.
Brown sugar, powdered sugar, and a little pinch of salt round out our dry ingredients. Then we go in with some vanilla bean paste (or vanilla extract), a tablespoon or two of milk, and finally mini chocolate chips.
Now, I know I go on and on about using chopped chocolate instead of chocolate chip cookies for cookies, but the mini chocolate chips are key here. They’re all the same size and small enough to not get stuck in our piping tips when we’re putting the filling on the macaron shells.
Try not to eat all of the frosting before you finish putting together the macarons. It’s hard to resist because it really does taste exactly like our beloved cookies, but this time it belongs in our macarons. That’s it! I hope you love these brown butter chocolate chip macarons as much as I do. Two of our favourite treats in one. What more could we ask for? Go ahead and bake, friends. If you make these, please share a picture with me. I’d love to see them!
Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Macarons
Ingredients
- Macaron Shells:
- 137g almond flour
- 120g powdered sugar
- 5g dark cocoa powder
- 105g egg whites
- 105g sugar
- Filling:
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/3 cup light brown sugar
- 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
- 2 tsp. vanilla bean paste
- 1-2 tbsp. milk
- 3/4 cup mini chocolate chips
Directions
- Step 1 Macaron Shells:
- Step 2 To start, put the almond flour, powdered sugar, and cocoa powder in a food processor and blend thoroughly. Sift into a bowl to ensure there are no lumps.
- Step 3 In the bowl of a stand mixer (make sure it’s clean and dry), beat the egg whites until foamy. Slowly add the sugar, about 2 tbsp at a time, beating on a medium speed. Once the sugar has dissolved, increase speed to medium high and beat until a thick glossy meringue forms. The mixture should form stiff peaks and you should be able to tip the bowl over your head with none of the mixture coming out.
- Step 4 With a large, flat rubber spatula, gently fold 1/3 of almond flour/powdered sugar mixture into egg whites until combined. Repeat until all of the almond mixture has been added. Fold to combine until you see no streaks of almond flour in the batter. The batter should be pretty fluid, a lot of people describe as a lava-like consistency. It should run smoothly off the spatula when you pull it out. This part comes with practice. Once you know the consistency, you’ll just be able to feel when it’s ready.
- Step 5 Pipe the batter into circles onto parchment or silicone lined baking sheets. Bang the tray a few times on a table to remove air bubbles and allow to sit for about 30 minutes before baking. To see if they’re ready for baking, touch your finger to them. If you get batter on your finger, they need to rest longer.
- Step 6 While resting, preheat your oven to 300°F with a rack placed in the lower third of the oven. Bake, one sheet at a time, for 15-18 minutes (this depends on your oven, my old one was fine at 15 minutes, this one needs 17-18). The shells should cool completely before you remove them from the parchment/silicone.
- Step 7 Filling:
- Step 8 Brown your butter. Remove from the heat, cool, the refrigerate until it reaches the consistency of softened butter.
- Step 9 Heat the oven to 350°F. Spread the flour on a baking pan and cook for 5-10 minutes. Allow it to cool completely before adding it to the frosting.
- Step 10 Place the brown butter in a bowl/mixer and beat for 3 minutes, until light and fluffy.
- Step 11 Add in the brown sugar and confectioners sugar and mix to combine. Pour in the flour and a little pinch of salt and mix again.
- Step 12 Add the vanilla bean paste and beat for 30 seconds, then add in 1 tbsp. of milk and beat together. Add more milk if needed to reach your desired consistency. Finally, stir in the mini chocolate chips.
- Step 13 Assembly:
- Step 14 Pair up the macaron shells. Pipe the filling on one half of each macaron pair and sandwich together.
