Not magazine cover beautiful…but delicious.

I don;t think I am done with these yet…I think that I still plan on working with them and seeing if I can come up with the dream recipe.  Taste-wise these were close it was the texture that was off.

Don’t blend the pistachios too much, the oil will cause them to turn into pistachio butter rather than pistachio meal.

The batter is an amazing meon green but the cookies seem to get an edible color by the time they are cooked

Pistachio Macarons

• 1-3/4 cup confectioner’s sugar
• grated peel from one lemon
• juice from one lemon
  
• 1 cup pistachios
• 3 large egg whites
• Pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 3 oz white chocolate melted

Grind the confectioner’s and the pistachios up together in the blender until it is a fine powder.  Set aside.

Beat egg whites and salt until frothy, slowly add sugar until medium peaks form.  Slowly add lemon peel and juice, keep beating.  Egg whites should have medium stiff peaks when the beater is lifted.

Fold the pistachio and confectioners mixture into the egg whites.  Try to keep the egg whites from losing volume.

Pipe in small circles on a parchment lined baking sheet.  Allow to stand for 15 minutes.

Bake at 325 for 15 minutes or until dry looking and done.  Cool.

FIll with lemon curd and drizzle with white chocolate

Makes 12.

image:marye audet (c) 2009

Post from: Baking Delights

As I have said before, I love breakfast but I really hate making it.  Yes, I am a morning person, and yes I love cooking but the idea of getting up and having to cook is what does me in.

So, in my fantasies I am the quintessential 1950’s sit-com mom (no! Not Lucy!) with the apron, the coiffed hair, the pearls and high heels; but in reality I wear jeans, barefoot most of the time, and I almost always have flour or batter marks on my jean legs where I have cleaned my hands on them rather than being reasonable and wearing an apron.  There is nothing…NOTHING like going to the grocery store to pick up an ingredient you overlooked and realizing that you have two perfectly placed flour handprints on your backside.

Yes.  True confessions.  Oh, and that spot on my jeans?  Chili.

My life is a sitcom sometimes but not the logical and reasonable ones of the fifties and sixties.  For example, as I write this I am sitting at the kitchen table in a Saturday morning kitchen (messy).  The fire is crackling in the fireplace and I am sipping coffee that should have been either drank or poured out hours ago.   I happened to lean forward in my chair and one of the cats took that as an invitation to curl up on most of the chair seat, leaving me balancing precariously on the edge and unable to lean back and enjoy the heat of the fire as opposed to just the cheerful crackle of it.  The dog, on the other hand, is on the cold, wood floor, looking at me imploringly to put my feet up on the hearth so he has an excuse to lay up there by the warmth of the fire and still be fulfilling his dogly duty of lying at my feet.

In the midst of  all of this I really do have a recipe for you.  I made lemon pistachio muffins and they are sunshiny and good…and they are also from a 1950s cookbook that I have.  Well, the pistachio part isn’t…

Anyway, These make twelve 1950s style muffins.  That means they are about 1/4 the size of what we consider a muffin to be now.  Plan on 12 little ones or 6 “normal size” with this recipe.

Lemon Pistachio Muffins

• 1 1/3 c flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 3 tablespoons butter, melted
• grated rind from 2 lemons
• juice from two lemons (about 1/2 cup)
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1/2 cup chopped pistachios
• confectioner’s sugar for dusting

1. Preheat the oven to 425
2. Mix the sugar, egg, butter and lemon juice well
3. Beat in the lemon rind and sour cream
4. Mix the dry ingredients together and stir in
5. Fold in the pistachios
6. Put in muffin cups and bake for 20 minutes or until done
7. Cool slightly and dust with confectioners sugar

How easy is that?

images:(c) 2009 Marye Audet, all rights reserved

Post from: Baking Delights