Cheezz, re; your weeping macaroons. Alice made a few suggestions...

traca

Well-known member
Hey Cheezz, posed your question to Alice Medrich and here's your original recipe, with her modifications in parenthesis.

You'll she recommends:

- Amount of coconut is now cups

- Lower the amount of sweetened condensed milk

- Let the batter sit for an hour before baking

- Mound your batter in 2 tblsp portions

- Notes about the chocolate (a double boiler works, and it's likely you'll have some left over)

Jumbo Black Bottom Coconut Macaroons

From Big Fat Cookies by Elinor Klivans

(MODIFICATIONS by Alice Medrich)

Makes 16 small cookies or 10 large cookies

Moist-on-the-inside and crisp-on-the-outside!!

Cookies:

One 7-ounce bag (2 2/3 cups) shredded sweetened coconut

1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk (use 1/3 cup)

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoons almond extract

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 large egg white

Pinch of cream of tartar

Chocolate Coating:

9 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped

Position a rack in the middle of the oven. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and butter the paper.

Make the cookies. In a large bowl, use a fork to stir the coconut, condensed milk, salt, almond extract and vanilla together. Set aside. (note: let this sit for about 1 hour to meld well)

In an impeccably clean medium bowl, use a whisk or a hand-held mixer on low speed to beat the egg white with the cream of tartar until they are foamy and the cream of tartar dissolves. Whisking vigorously or beating on medium-high speed, beat until soft peaks form. Whisk or beat in the sugar. Use a rubber spatula to fold half of the whipped egg white in the coconut mixture, then fold in the remaining white.

Scoop mounds of the coconut batter (about 2 tbl. size) onto the prepared baking sheet, spacing the macaroons 2 inches apart.

Bake until the bottoms of the cookies and the tips of the coconut shreds are light brown, about 20 minutes. Cool the cookies on the baking sheet for 5 minutes, then slide a metal spatula under the macaroons to loosen them from the parchment and transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Make the chocolate coating. Put the chocolate in a heatproof container or the top of a double boiler and place it over, but not touching, a saucepan of barely simmering water (or the bottom of the double boiler) - or heat in microwave oven for about 1 min. Stir until the chocolate is melted and smooth. Remove from water and let cool to thicken slightly, about 10 min.

Scrape the chocolate coating into a small bowl. Dip the bottom of each macaroon in the chocolate and place the cookies, chocolate bottoms up or on the sides, on a wire rack. (You will have some chocolate coating left over for another use or to pour over ice cream. It's easier to dip using a larger amount of coating.) Let the macaroons sit at room temperature until the chocolate coating is firm, about 1 hour. Or, to speed the firming of the chocolate, refrigerate the macaroons on the rack for about 15 minutes. Serve cold or at room temperature.

The cookies can be stored in a covered container in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.

 
Thanks so much, Traca - and tell Alice thanks!! I tried letting it sit for 30 min., so I guess

I was on the right track, but decreasing the milk makes sense, too. This is really such a fabulous recipe that I didn't want to scrap it. I know others have raved about recipe from this Big Fat Cookies cookbook, but this is the only one I've tried.

 
Decreasing the milk makse sense to me. Also, I was thinking, sometimes I

buy coconut and it's old and dry. Sometimes it's quite moist. I'm thinking a longer rest time will allow more of the liquid to absorb. Age of coconut might make a difference too. If it seems dry, I'd probably heat it up a little just to jumpstart the rehydration and then let it sit longer. (Like rehydrating other dried fruit.)

 
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