Annabelle was having her first birthday party and it was time for a celebration. Her mother was recovering from an accident and had been away from home for many months, now she was back in Oxford doing physical rehabilitation and getting ready to return to home. Annabelle, her daughter and my second granddaughter, was turning one, Beth was back, time for a party!
Annabelle is one
French macarons are all done
time to celebrate
Annabelle eating her first macaron!
Beth had lived in Paris for a year after college and wanted Annabelle to have a French birthday. A lot of planning went into this special event. Beth requested French macarons to serve with the birthday cake and I, being a novice and naive baker, volunteered to make them. I had no idea how challenging baking macarons can be.
My first macarons, blemishes and all!
I read and researched how to bake macarons and we discussed different ways to flavor the them. I decided to use the basic macaron and buttercream recipes in the Bouchon Bakery cookbook. To flavor the macaron shell, I added one teaspoon of rosewater to the macaronage. The filling was a circle of Italian buttercream flavored with raspberry preserves with a bullseye of the raspberry preserves. The result was a rosewater raspberry macaron.
rose water raspberry macaron
My first macarons were not picturesque but they passed the taste test. Beth and Annabelle loved them, that was all that mattered!
Annabelle's first birthday cake, the macarons around the bottom of the cake are the ones I baked.