Sky & Helene's Macarons

I know two macaron posts in two days seems like overkill - but the day before we made ours I was in Moore Wilson Fresh and spied this awesome little box (sealed with wax!). After I had advised the guy behind the pastry counter that the blackboard contained a spelling mistake (it said "macaroons", not "macarons" - impressively, he immediately called his supervisor over to tell her so it could be fixed, which made me feel even more ridiculously pedantic) I requested a box (they were tucked away behind the counter). At $7.50 for a box of four they're not cheap, but come cheaper than Christchurch's J'aime les Macarons, which are $2.50 each.

I was a bit disappointed when I got home and realised that the box of four only contained two flavours; the poster on the cabinet they were in showed four different macarons so I had assumed each box was an assortment. Oh well, at least I didn't get the coffee flavour!

Our selection had two lemon macarons and two chocolate ones. I was sad to see that they don't look illustriously filled, but they are flawlessly smooth and macaron-y looking.

So, the big test; how do they taste, and how does that compare to the ones we made?

Well, the chocolate one was pretty tasty, with a rich chocolate flavour, though there was no substance to the shell - no chewiness, it was more like a light meringue biscuit than what I think of as macaron (bearing in mind I've only tried a couple so my judgement is not the most experienced). The lemon one was definitely lemony but I felt it lacked zing - and it really didn't seem to contain much filling. I tend to think that if you were trying these having never tasted macarons before you might think they were either overrated or overpriced.

With, obviously, a slight bias, both Mr Cake and I thought our homemade macarons were better. We agreed that our buttercream filling needed more flavour (for both the passionfruit and the raspberry) but both still packed a better punch than the lemon. The shells on our macarons definitely had the chew factor - far more enjoyable.

 

From an aesthetic perspective, the bought ones are obviously a bit neater - I like how the foot isn't splayed out - but were lots flatter, and I suspect it's not completely authentic for them to be as rounded as mine but I like them. I also think a good macaron should have a visible filling - because you eat with your eyes too!

What do you guys think? Tell me the truth; I can take it! How do mine stack up lookwise - and do you know what makes a macaron kosher?



Sky & Helene's Macarons are available from Moore Wilson Fresh on the corner of Tory & College Streets, Wellington, ph 04 384 9906

Lovely little cakes from J'aime les Macarons

I've long been a fan of J'aime les Macarons - they definitely win at macarons. I'm yet to have any other macarons as good in New Zealand - and I have tried plenty. They featured on our wedding dessert table, and we try to make them appear at as many special occasions as we can (especially as a few family members can't have gluten, and macarons are gluten free). They're not limited to Cantabrians, either - they have stockists around the country, including Kirkcaldie & Stains in Wellington.

A few years ago they expanded their repertoire to include exquisite little cakes, and I'd be lying if I claimed this was the first time I'd tried them but just for you guys (ha!) we went there over the weekend (while in Christchurch for a wedding) to pick up a few to review (unfortunately these ones are only available in Christchurch).

From left; strawberry and vanilla layer cake; chocolate caramel tart; peach dome;
chocolate caramel layer cake; rhubarb, raspberry and pistachio Alaska

The chocolate caramel tart took my heart - it's incredibly rich so if that's not you then maybe go for one of the fruitier options. But if gooey caramel and rich, dark chocolate topped with crunchy chocolate pearls sounds appealing then we are kindred spirits and you should pop down to The Colombo at your earliest convenience and try one.

The mini baked Alaska is also pretty awesome, with flavourfully fruity raspberry mousseline and rhubarb compote hidden inside. I am a fan of all things textural, so I am always pleased to dig into a treat like this and discover layers of differing deliciousness inside.

They were all delicious, but the Alaska cake and the two chocolatey ones were definitely my picks of the five we tried. The range is changing all the time, but those three seem to be part of the core range, so maybe the classics trump the seasonal offerings... Or maybe my bias for chocolate is getting in the way of the sweet summer cakes. At any rate, none will disappoint.

Have you had any amazing cakes recently? And have you tried J'aime les Macarons' treats? 

J'aime les Macarons is located in The Colombo, 363 Colombo Street, Christchurch. Macarons are available from a number of other stockists throughout New Zealand and to order online from the website, www.jaimelesmacarons.co.nz. 

J'aime les macarons, Christchurch

I have definitely caught a little bit of macaron fever from the blogosphere (who knew these things were contagious?) and have been eagerly trying macarons wherever I see them - they're still rare enough in New Zealand that there aren't too many options. J'aime les macarons was, so far as I know, first on the scene in NZ, and is based in Christchurch. Recently some other options have been popping up - but so far as I can tell J'aime les macarons (which means "I love macarons" in French) is the premium option. So with a weekend in Christchurch I had to make the pilgrimmage to the lovely wee shop on Normans Road. Amanda,who runs the shop, is super friendly and we had a big old gossip about food and the exciting Feast of Canterbury, which starts on Wednesday.

Eventually I chose a box of 6 - hard to choose, with nine alluring-sounding flavours on offer - and it was packaged up nice and neatly for me. They are a nice size - a little bit bigger than the others I've bought, but still a nice, dainty treat size. And of course, super pretty. 

The box is perfect for my six and it's really hard to wait to eat them - I want to tear into them immediately. I managed to hold off for more than 24 hours, though, how's that for restraint?

So the important thing - how was the eating? Well, for starters, as you can see from the photos, each macaron has a plentiful and inviting filling of either buttercream or ganache - helps whet the appetite and meant that each one was packed with flavour. The flavours we tried were:

Pistachio - this was tasty, with pistachio in both the shell and the filling. The buttercream was lovely, though I didn't find the pistachio flavour particularly strong.

Passionfruit - from my limited macaron experience I've developed a preference for passionfruit to be delivered via buttercream, not ganache. Obviously I was doing it wrong, though, because this was great, with the tang of the passionfruit cutting through the rich chocolate.

Coconut - it was definitely coconutty, reminded me of the macaroon, the macaron's oft-mistaken-for distant relative. Probably my least favourite of the bunch but still completely enjoyable.

Pear and ginger - this had a little square of crystallised ginger hidden in the middle, yum! The pear flavour didn't really shine through for me but I love ginger so this was a definite win.

Salted butter caramel - this tied for gold in my metaphorical macaron medal ceremony - the flavour was rich, bitter, salty, everything you could want, and the chewy shell completed the combo.

Bitter chocolate - now, I may have mentioned this before, but I'm more of a milk chocolate kind of gal, and milk chocolate was actually one of the flavours on offer in the shop but Mr Cake chose this one and I figured with so many other fantastic options I couldn't really go with the milk choc as well. Hmm, well, if this one was anything to go by I'm officially regretting that decision - it was almost enough to convert me to the dark side. ;-) The centre was so rich, so truffle-y, soooo good - the only thing that would have made it better would have been if it was milk chocolate (though Mr Cake disagrees).

So, I guess I love J'aime les macarons - I'm a bit sad to be back in Wellington, too far away to nip back into the shop so I can sample the milk chocolate one. You can get them mail order off the website but having a whole box of those fabulous things seems more than a little dangerous, especially hot on the heels of all the eating I've done during Wellington on a Plate - maybe it's time for me to exercise a little restraint. ;-)




J'aime les macarons is located at 9F Normans Road, Strowan, Christchurch, ph 03 355 0597

Loud Shirt Day Macarons

My workplace is fundraising for Loud Shirt Day, which is this Friday and helps raise awareness for two charities who work to enable deaf children to listen and speak like their peers via cochlea implants and hearing aids. 

As well as everyone bringing a donation for the privilege of wearing their best worst shirt to work on Friday today we had a morning tea today, where everyone put some money in the jar and in return got to nibble on various baked treats brought in by colleagues. I was thinking about what to make, but figured whatever it was it should be loud. Macarons, aside from being a minor current obsession of mine (oh, the chewy goodness!) are almost always coloured anyway, so the idea struck me of making some which were as offensive-looking as I could. I know, part of eating is with your eyes - and though they worked out exactly as I wanted I thought they looked disgusting and was a bit apologetic. My colleagues loved them, though - and actually a bunch of people commented that their kids would think they were brilliant. I'm still a bit unsure as to whether to call this a success - I like pretty, nice things too much!

There are a few things that are important in macaron-making, and one is being precise. You can probably afford to be out by a couple of grams but any more than that could have an unhappy ending, so you will need to weigh out the ingredients. I also strongly recommend that you pulse the almonds and icing sugar in a food processor, even if the almonds are already ground, as they will still be coarse and will affect the smoothness of the macarons. It's recommended to add the colour at this stage, too, but I split the batter in two to get two different, bright colours so I left mine till a bit later.

I had been planning to make these for Friday morning and hadn't yet aged my egg whites (you are supposed to separate the eggs and leave the whites on the bench, covered with cling film, for 1-5 days prior to making the macarons), and discovered a handy tip, suggesting I could simply put the whites in the microwave for 10 seconds to get the aging effect. While my macarons worked out, they weren't perfect and this was by no means a scientific trial! I think I'd prefer to have them sitting in a bowl on the bench for a couple of days - but a good shortcut if you need it. I would recommend watching closely, though; it wouldn't take much to have scrambled eggs!

I coloured half my batter with a deep pink colouring, and the other half blue. To create the weird, loud-shirt mottled effect I just put both into the same piping bag. In as much as was possible I did half and half - try to avoid mixing once it's in the bag as obviously this would combine the two and it would just be purple - and where it wasn't possible (i.e. at the narrow end) I just layered the colours.

I was very pleased with the effect - the two colours remained very distinct - and will likely use this again in the future, with more natural tones. I've heard this also works well for buttercream, if you want different shades in your cupcake swirls. Unfortunately, as I did this before work this morning in a bit of a hurry it would appear I omitted to take any photos of my muddled piping bag, but trust me when I say there wasn't any science to it! ;-)

Doesn't it look awful? Definitely fitted the "Loud Shirt Day" brief, though, I feel. Just... doesn't really look like food.

Once cooked there was some variation - I had made two batches, and had less pink colour to use the second time, but also baked two trays at a time and the top tray in both batches came out with paler colours - I'm sure all down to the temperature but it is curious to see so much difference when they were the same going in.

I used the same macaron recipe I have used previously, and my good old trusty buttercream, but this time used lime zest, lemon zest and a tiny bit of lime juice to flavour the buttercream.

You can use any flavour you like, but adding more than about 1 teaspoon of liquid will cause the buttercream to split - this happened to mine today (you can see if you look carefully at the photos below). It doesn't affect the flavour but it looks less pretty and is not so perfect texturally. I added lime juice because the zest turned out not to be enough, by my tastebuds; it would have been better to replace some of the water in the sugar syrup (the first step in the buttercream recipe) with lime juice, as this is incorporated fully into the buttercream and forms the structure. Moral of the story; if you want to add liquid flavours, add them to the syrup (and subtract the equivalent quantity of water). As you can see above I also added a generous swipe of green food colouring (I used gel colour, though you should be able to get away with a drop or two of liquid stuff if you need to) to get the lurid shade I needed to clash with the pink and blue.

And there we have it! Rows of revolting-looking (but utterly delicious) macarons. The lime buttercream was great - the lime was not overly prominent, but perfectly balanced the butter. Since discovering the few left in the fridge about an hour ago Mr Cake has had three - and that's about as good an endorsement as I can offer!

I normally try to steer clear of utterly fake looking colouring, and I realised when I heard some colleagues talking about how gross they looked that probably if I hadn't known what they were I wouldn't have eaten them myself. Would you be put off by the colour or would you be intrigued?

Macarons
Ingredients90g egg whites (about 3 small eggs)
25g castor sugar
200g icing sugar
110g almonds (ground, slivered or blanched)
powdered food colour

Beat the egg whites to a foam (think bubble bath!), and gradually add the sugar until you have a glossy meringue. Put the remaining ingredients in a food processor and pulse until almonds are finely ground. Fold the dry ingredients into the egg whites, until ingredients are well combined and mixture falls back on itself in 10 seconds. Test the mixture by putting a little on a plate; if the top flattens it's ready, if not give the batter a couple more folds to remove a little more air.

Use a piping bag and plain, wide tip to pipe small mounds onto two baking sheets lined with baking paper. Leave for 30-60 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 130 C. Bake for 15-20 minutes - when done you should be able to easily lift a macaron off the tray in one piece. Makes about 24 macarons.

Buttercream Icing (makes enough for two batches of macarons)
100g sugar
60g water
Seeds of 1 vanilla bean or 1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 egg yolk
200g unsalted butter, at room temperature
Flavor of choice (add flavour to taste; I used zest of 3 limes, 1 lemon, and juice of 1 lime)

Combine sugar, water, vanilla and any other liquid flavour (subtracting an equivalent amount of water) in a saucepan over medium heat until sugar dissolves. Continue to cook, without stirring, until syrup reaches 125 degrees C.

While the syrup is heating, begin to whisk egg and yolk at high speed until pale and foamy. Once syrup is at the correct temperature, reduce speed to low and slowly pour syrup into bowl. Raise speed to medium-high and continue beating until thick and satiny and mixture is cool to touch.

Mash butter until soft and creamy. On medium speed, add the butter in two-tablespoon chunks. Once all butter has been added, raise speed to high and beat until thick and shiny. Add flavour and beat for an additional minute or so.

AssemblyTo assemble, pair the macarons with similar sized shells. Pipe a small mound of buttercream onto one half then gently press together. Refrigerate to firm the icing (and store refrigerated) but serve at room temperature. The macaron cookies (unfilled) can be kept at room temperature in an airtight container for up to a week before filling, or can be frozen. The whole cookies can also be frozen.

Our Wedding Dessert Table

I've written about the wedding as a whole on my wedding blog, so as to avoid boring you all with soppy details (if you like soppy wedding stuff you can read it here), but thought I'd show you my special project, which was the centrepiece of our reception and much enjoyed by guests.

For the last few years there's been a trend to present luscious banquets of sweets in style, and I've been desperately wanting an excuse to execute something over the top and completely ridiculous. Amy Atlas is my main inspiration - her tables are always stunning, and her approach is pragmatic, using unexpected household items to decorate and assemble her displays.

Anyway, a wedding seemed like the perfect excuse to pull a little something together.

The first rule was that I wasn't going to make the desserts. Well, maybe one. But definitely not the cake. Quite aside from the fact that making wedding cake is downright stressful, I know too many purveyors of excellent cake, and here was my opportunity to let them show off a bit.

Were there other rules? Not really. I compiled a list of the things I particularly wanted on the table (Denheath custard squares! Macarons from J'aime les Macarons! Bohemein chocolates!) and sought prices (ouch). And then I moved on to modelling the proposed layout in Microsoft Visio so I could source appropriately sized platters and stands (proportions are important! And yes, I'm obsessed). This is the diagram (top elevation and side elevation)(did I mention that I'm obsessed?):

Presentation
Once I had done this I could start looking for platters properly. I wanted plain white, because there was enough going on already, and I thought they'd be easy to hire. Wrong! Apparently only caterers use these, and apparently caterers don't like to hire out plates for not-their-own food (fair enough). I scoured TradeMe, rang hire places, asked around... And eventually bought a stack of Maxwell Williams ones from Briscoes at half price. I also found some nice wooden trays on TradeMe, bottles and jars from Arthur Holmes, and hired some pretty glass candy jars from Oh Buttercup. At the last minute I got my Dad to chop up some bits of 2x4 to elevate the black forest jellies we made, and Mum wrapped them in tissue paper so nobody could tell they were just lumps of wood! Innovation for the win. :-)

Purchasing
Once we had an idea how many people were coming I ordered the goodies - over ordered in most cases, but who's complaining about leftovers? Not me!

I'm a big fan of a bargain if they're going, and if you're buying a lot of something make sure you ask if they have a bulk discount - as an example Bohemein apply their loyalty scheme so basically for every $100 you spend you get about $20 worth of chocolate free.  Also, some companies can personalise their product for you - J'aime les Macarons regularly colour-match macarons to wedding themes and it doesn't cost any extra.

I had a list of what had been ordered, when to pick it up, and if it was paid or not. Most places were paid in advance to reduce the thinking we had to do the week of the wedding - it meant I could send whichever brother-in-law or parent was available to do pick-up duty!

Assembly
Pulling it all together was the part where I failed slightly. I spent some time the night before putting chocolates on plates, and then wafted about during the hair-and-make-up time putting macarons and doughnuts on plates (for me putting pretty food on pretty plates in pretty piles is pretty much the best relaxation activity around - perfect for pre-weddingitis!).

We had told the caterers in advance what we needed them to do during the party (plate custard squares at the beginning of the reception; pour chocolate milk at dessert time; provide plates and cutlery) but I didn't leave instructions for putting things on the table, so Mr Cake and I went off to have photos taken and get married and stuff, and when we arrived at the reception the table still needed to be set up. It was fine, as the caterers were supremely helpful and we got it all sorted in a matter of minutes, but would have been a bit better to have sorted it out earlier.

My table isn't as styled as some of those I admire, but then adding much more might have been over the top - and a pet peeve of mine is that the pretty tables tend to have plates with, say, eight items on it. Are there more than eight people at your party? Yes? Then that is just mean! So my focus was ensuring that the supply was ample, which does affect aesthetics.

Most items were just set out on their plates. The doughnuts were piled high (and yes, I planned the number of doughnuts perfectly so that I could make them into pyramids, don't judge me) and the jellies we on the aforementioned timber. The custard squares, which come frozen, were set out at the beginning of the reception and defrosted on the table, which meant they were just right at dessert time - otherwise chilled things would need to go out when dessert was served. And the chocolate milk was poured (with a funnel!) into the mini milk bottles just before serving, because warm milk is not all that awesome.

The desserts were:

• wedding cake (carrot, chocolate and red velvet cake layers) by Sweet Kitchen
• jellybeans from The Lolly Shop (jars from Oh Buttercup)
• treat size custard squares from Denheath
• sea salt caramel and melting passion ganache chocolates from Bohemein
• black forest jellies, made by us (very easy - recipe to follow!)
• caramel hit and dusted sugar doughnuts from Couplands
• passionfruit and salted butter caramel macarons from J'aime les Macarons
• chocolate milk from the supermarket 
• dessert cakes from Just Desserts 

What do you think? Completely over the top, or within acceptable parameters for Mr and Mrs Cake? Would you (or have you) ever planned something like this? 


Photos by the amazing Frank Visser. 

Macarons!

Macarons have taken the foodie world by storm over the last few years - a decadent confection consisting of egg white, almond, sugar, and whatever filling takes your fancy. Sounds simple, yes? Perhaps not so much! To be fair, though, they are not that difficult - a little fussy but even if they don't come out perfectly I'm sure you will still enjoy the results; and although I've only made them twice I've been very happy with the results both times.

To me the hardest part is remembering to separate the eggs ahead; apparently the whites are more stable if they're aged at room temperature for a couple of days beforehand. I know it seems wrong but I have done it twice now and have gotten over it a bit. Probably helps that the season means our apartment is not too warm; otherwise it might weird me out a bit more.

The process is straightforward if you are a seasoned baker; beat egg whites until foamy, add sugar gradually, then blitz the almonds and more sugar, and fold into the egg mixture with a bit of powdered colour.

The flavour in macarons in most cases comes mainly from the filling - the nutty quality of the cookies is delicious but really comes alive with a tangy, fruity buttercream or a rich ganache filling. You can also change the nuts - my understanding is that this works best if you keep half the almonds, and replace the other half with, say, pistachios. 

Once you've made the batter you pipe the mixture onto a baking tray:

You could use a spoon to place small mounds if you don't have a piping bag but it's much quicker this way. Once you've piped the mixture out you're supposed to leave it to rest for 30-60 minutes; this allows the batter to form a light crust, which creates a smooth top shell when you bake them and gives the oh-so-desirable 'foot' at the base of the cooked macaron. I'm not sure why the foot is such a feature but I presume it's a good signal that your macarons have succeeded; it's caused by the pre-crusted shell being raised during cooking - since the shell has had the chance to harden a bit the whole thing rises, leaving a thin layer of rough, aerated cookie at the base. Anyway, I expect this is a bit boring for all but the most obsessed of you, so moving right along...

For filling, you can use pretty much any recipe you like; the first time I made these I used ganache, so wanted to try something fruity this time around. I made a French buttercream and split the recipe in two, flavouring half with passionfruit pulp and half with raspberries.

French buttercream (educational post today, folks!) is made by beating a sugar syrup into egg yolks until fluffy, and then gradually adding butter until thick and creamy. Definitely not a recipe I'd recommend if you don't have an electric beater - my wrist got sore holding the beater up so a stand mixer would be the ideal contraption for this!

Again, this is not a difficult recipe, but getting the sugar syrup to the right stage takes some patience, and preferably a thermometer. If you don't want to be this fussy you don't have to, though - just about anything that will hold together will work - a more basic buttercream, ganache, even a simple marscapone/fruit combo - the world is your oyster! As for the pretty colours, you'll need powdered colours to achieve these; most cake decorating or chocolate making shops would have these, and there are plenty of places you can buy them online, too. They tend to be $6 or so for a bottle but you only use a tiny amount at a time so they will last ages. I didn't quite use enough for mine - make sure the mixture looks nice and vibrant as the colour will pale a little as they cook.

Macarons (makes 24 sandwiched cookies; recipe from Tartlette)
Ingredients
90g egg whites (the three size 6 eggs I cracked yielded 100g)
25g castor sugar
200g icing sugar
110g almonds (ground, slivered or blanched)
powdered food colour

Beat the egg whites to a foam (think bubble bath!), and gradually add the sugar until you have a glossy meringue. Put the remaining ingredients in a food processor and pulse until almonds are finely ground (this is recommended even if you have ground almonds, but the previous time I made these I just mixed these ingredients in a separate bowl, which worked out well).

Fold the dry ingredients into the egg whites, until ingredients are well combined and mixture falls back on itself in 10 seconds. Test the mixture by putting a little on a plate; if the top flattens it's ready, if not give the batter a couple more folds to remove a little more air.

Use a piping bag and plain, wide tip to pipe small mounds onto two baking sheets. Leave for 30-60 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 130 C.

Bake for 15-20 minutes - when done you should be able to easily lift a macaron off the tray in one piece.

Buttercream Icing (note; this makes enough for two batches of macarons)
Ingredients
100g sugar
60g water
Seeds of 1 vanilla bean or 1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 egg yolk
200g unsalted butter, at room temperature
Flavor of choice (with this recipe I tend to add flavour gradually to taste - hence no measurement)

Combine sugar, water and vanilla in a saucepan over medium heat until sugar dissolves. Continue to cook, without stirring, until syrup reaches 125 degrees celcius.

While the syrup is heating, begin to whisk egg and yolk at high speed until pale and foamy. Once syrup is at the correct temperature, reduce speed to low and slowly pour syrup into bowl. Raise speed to medium-high and continue beating until thick and satiny and mixture is cool to touch.

Mash butter until soft and creamy. On medium speed, add the butter in two-tablespoon chunks. Once all butter has been added, raise speed to high and beat until thick and shiny. Add flavor and beat for an additional minute or so.

Assembly
To assemble, pair the macarons with similar sized shells - if yours are like mine there will be some variation! Pipe a small mound of buttercream onto one half then gently press together. Refrigerate to firm the icing (and store refrigerated) but serve at room temperature. The macaron cookies (unfilled) can be kept at room temperature in an airtight container for up to a week before filling, or can be frozen. The whole cookies can also be frozen.

(by the way, gold leaf is the most annoying thing in the world to use!)

Macarons from Bohemien

It seems that the macaron movement is gaining momentum in Wellington; yesterday I popped into Bohemien during my lunch break to get a small treat to brighten up my Friday, and what did I see but an array of brightly coloured macarons just beckoning to me.

I am pretty familiar with their chocolates (thanks in large part to Mr Cake) so figured, although it was a chocolatey treat I had in mind, that macarons might now be on on the menu.

They had a pretty drool-worthy range of flavours, and though I am not a huge fan of very fakey-looking colours (and there is no denying that some of the airbrushing doesn't quite look the right colour for food) I definitely couldn't resist. I asked where they are made and was told they're made in the Bohemien kitchen in Hataitai.

I was probably about the most annoying customer ever, because I fluffed around for ages trying to decide, then wanted to know if they'd be packaged enough that I could get them home intact. The woman who served me very kindly packed them in tissue paper in a paper bag after placing them in their cellophane, so they were were well protected and made it home in perfect condition. Wonderful service!

The first we tried was the chilli one - it was filled with a lovely, bittersweet chocolate ganache and the chilli flavour was faint but it was delicious all the same. The macaron was very delicate, very fragile yet crunchy and chewy (perhaps not quite as chewy as I like but I still haven't worked out if that preference is just a result of the one I've made being less than perfect!).

Next on my plate was the raspberry flavour - I didn't rate this one too much - nothing wrong with it but it also wasn't remarkable. Maybe I'm too fussy. ;-)

The damson plum flavour was too alluring to pass by, and when I looked at the filling I was disappointed because it looked to be a plain buttercream - no colour which seemed odd for plum flavour. However, my faith was restored when I bit into it, and discovered that a thin rim of buttercream hid the jammy filling, which was deliciously fruity and definitely lived up to expectations.

Last but not least was the sea salt caramel flavour - and this definitely met and exceeded expectations. The filling was deliciously gooey caramel with a rich, full flavour. The salt wasn't very powerful but otherwise this was perfect. Both of us liked this one most, and I can say with confidence that I will have more of these as little treats at the end of the week - at $1.50 each they are much cheaper than the other macarons I've seen in Wellington, so a very affordable little morsel.



Bohemein is located at 109 Featherston Street, Wellington, ph 04 386 2974, or 35 Wairoa Road, Hataitai, ph 04 499 7913, www.bohemein.co.nz