Macaroon Madness

I have become obsessed with Coconut Macaroons these days. My family seems to be okay with this, since they're eating every last one that I make (if I don't eat them all first), but they may start asking for good, old-fashioned chocolate chip cookies one of these days. Well, I don't always leave that recipe alone, either, but that's for another posting.

It all started with a rather innocent question from my stepdaughter about how to make macaroons. Macaroons have always been a favorite of mine. I remember getting them from the fancier grocery store in town when I was a kid, as a special treat. I loved the chewy interior and crunchy exterior. I've tried to make them with sweetened condensed milk, but that just wasn't the texture I was looking for. (I have to say, I could eat an entire can of sweetened condensed milk with a spoon, but it didn't do it for me in the macaroon.)

I decided to try the recipe on the back of the Baker's Coconut bag. Now, Baker's has a few extra ingredients that I'm not crazy about adding to the food I feed my family (propylene glycol and sodium metabisulfate - for freshness and color), but I'm not always adamant about that. Heck, we know all the ingredients in Twinkies, but I'm not opposed to downing a few of them every once in a while. I'll be heading over to my local co-op sometime soon, since I'm sure they have a very good bag of coconut that I can use instead. I've even tried using freshly grated coconut, but more on that later.

The Baker's recipe was pretty much everything I was looking for, with a few tweaks, here and there. Here is my modified version of their recipe:

Coconut Macaroons

5 1/3 cups flaked coconut (14 oz.)

2/3 cups granulated sugar

1/4 cup flour

1/4 tsp. salt

4 egg whites (reserve the yolks for custard, lemon curd, or some other amazing treat)

1 tsp. almond extract

Combine the coconut, sugar, flour and salt in a bowl. Stir in the egg whites and almond extract until well mixed. Using a small ice cream scoop, or a spoon, drop onto a parchment covered pan (or, grease and flour the pan - don't use tin foil alone, since they will stick).

Bake at 325 F for 20 minutes, or until the edges are a nice toasty, golden brown. I pick them up (asbestos fingertips help) and check the bottoms for that golden brown color. Makes around 28 macaroons.

I love to serve the macaroons slightly warm. Okay, "serve" sounds pretty fancy. We all stand around the stove, staring at the macaroons, until I declare them cool enough to eat. Then, we devour them. The few left over I store in a container. If I hide them from the little foodies in the house, I might even still have a yummy treat to myself for up to 4 weeks. They can even be frozen. But, these morsels are easy to make when the mood strikes - which seems to be about once a week around here.

Next posting, I'll talk about my never-ending need to not leave well enough alone. The tea pot is boiling, and it's time for another cup of tea.