April Fooled by a chocolate bacon macaron?
Have you ever felt out of place at a fancy dress party? Last weekend Antoine and I arrived at the door unsuspectingly wearing pyjamas and cuddly bears to meet a sea of hand painted Venetian masks and hired gowns from the Carnaval of Venice to Captain outfits.
In our defense we were dressed as characters from a French children’s show, Bonne nuit les petits. It felt, however, as if we were the April Fools of the year. In France, they call it Poisson d’avril and its victims go around the rest of the day with a paper fish pinned to their back. But it was too early. No, this was no joke. No turning back. We were in that door and we had to carry it off amongst an array of anonymous forbidding masks and, apart from our neighbours, complete strangers. At least we were comfy dancing in our slippers.
April Fool! Poisson d’avril !
A good friend, Belinda, provided consolation with a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson:
“Be true to your own act and congratulate yourself, if you have done something strange and extravagant to break the monotony of a decorous age.” It so happened that Belinda was visiting from the US last week and so she was in the firing line to taste another macaron experiment to break away from the monotony of classic flavours…
This is too funny: you mean it’s not just chocolate? Wait a minute, I get it!
I took her photo seconds before she cracked up laughing.
The flavour? Dark chocolate and bacon. It’s not so mad, is it? We’ve seen bars of bitter chocolate with fleur de sel and seen chocolate chip and bacon cookies – so why not in a macaron?
The secret is not too much bacon, just enough to give a hint of saltiness and intrigue.
chocolate ganache with bacon rashers
Firstly, add a touch of fleur de sel to the chocolate shells, fry 5 streaky bacon rashers then infuse 2 bacon rashers in the cream for the ganache.
Infuse bacon rashers in the cream
Then discard the bacon from the cream and continue normally with a chocolate ganache. I did cut back slightly on the normal quantity of butter used, due to the presence of bacon fat. Julia Child did say that fat gives flavour, n’est-ce pas? (Note: I tried a batch before these ones, using allumettes (mini bacon bits) but they kept getting stuck in the piping nozzle and the end result was like eating tiny bullets in the ganache. So learn from my mistake. This next batch with infused bacon and rashers added to the ganache later was by far better.)
Place a cooked bacon rasher bit on top of the ganache
Cut up the rest of the bacon rashers with scissors and place on top of the ganache for each shell.
One wee tip: when putting any kind of “solid” in the ganache, always top it up slightly with a dash more ganache on top. That way the ganache can infuse perfectly into both shells over the next 24 or even 36 hours (if you can wait that long) for chocolate toe-curling bliss.
Add more ganache on top of the bacon before assembling
Et voilà, mes amis. Nothing fancy. Nothing complicated. Just more macaron fun!
Et maintenant…
Giveaway Winners to Celebrate the Fête du Macaron
As promised, it’s time to announce the 5 lucky winners of a copy of “Mad About Macarons!” from Waverley Books. A huge thank you to all of you who participated and for so many lovely comments. I honestly wish we could have given a copy to everybody!
Congratulations to:
- Jenna Parrington
- Mary Jane
- Mary Rosch
- Spinneys Cauldron
- Sylvie
Please send me an email ([email protected](dot)com) with your full name and address so that we can mail out your copy. For the rest of you, don’t worry. The macaron madness continues…. and who knows, we’re surely going to have another giveaway soon. 🙂 Stay tuned. vip-popki.net/prostitutka-lvov
Just remember: don’t be caught out tomorrow on April Fool’s Day. Poisson d’avril !!!
Don’t be caught out tomorrow. POISSON d’AVRIL !
Oh Yum!
Next time…doodly..doodly..do
choc + bacon is a GREAT combo!!
Was reading your blog on macarons. Thanks for the encouragement as I am still trying to perfect those little seem-so-easy-to-do macs! The tips you gave are really great. Guess I will work harder to make them but surely not attempting the bacon ones any time near – though bacons are my faves.
Thanks again!
I’m glad I found this site. I have enjoyed my time here, and I will be back to visit. Chocolate and bacon… love them both. Thanks for sharing!
Love your story, and oh my… chocolate and bacon in one bite I’m in!
I like that quote and I love these macarons! Salty/savory and sweet together make for a delightful meringue sandwich, I think! Yum!
Well being comfy while dancing is a seriously important issue, so I say you came out ahead 🙂 Now I do not eat meat but I have some bacon obsessed sons and they just so happen to equally love chocolate, so basically I am saying be happy you are not my neighbor (they are big boys) 🙂
Bacon macarons! Brilliant! Seems like chocolate and bacon are all the rage…I’ve got a bar of chocolate covered bacon in the fridge 🙂
I think chocolate and bacon is just brilliant! Sweet and salty with the satisfaction of pork fat…. mmmm. By George I think you’ve done it! And fuzzy slippers are way more fun than serious and heavy gowns and masks!
Um…you had us at bacon. Yummmm!!!
I can’T believe that I win this beautiful book. I am so happy. Sorry girls but one of this so colorful and so french Parisian book come in Canada. Merci mille fois. Bisous xxx Sylvie
I love your blog so much Jill and I have an award for you. You can collect it here:http://www.manusmenu.com/awards-galore
Hugs! 🙂
What a unique and intriguing flavor combination!
I ALWAYS feel out of place at fancy schmancy events :D. And if I ate meat, I’d be all over these bacon and chocolate macarons. Perhaps you can ship some to me for my boyfriend who LOVES everything bacon 😀
I would love to try one of these. Salty bacon and chocolate…why not? I think they sound super!
The macroons are looking awesome. love the new twist given to the traditional stuffing…. !
Bacon? Oh my! I’m IN!!! These look glorious!
Great blog; happy I found you!
Mary xo
Delightful Bitefuls
Wonderful dessert or how about…. lunch:)
Oh my…..sometimes you just have to be bold…then locate the nearest drink table. 😉
Mmmm…..beautiful combination of chocolate and bacon. That hint of salt would give these such a wonderful kick.
I used to get le poisson in my French class in high school! Oh, memories.
I really need to try bacon with chocolate, it’s so intriguing.
Now I might have assumed this was an April fool if I hadn’t seen so many reviews recently of bacon flavoured chocolate. I do find it hard to get my head around, a bit like the marmite chocolate that I’ve heard so much about. Being vegetarian, I’m not tempted, but as always your macaroons look fantastic.
Mmm dark chocolate and bacon sounds delicious! I like the fish tradition!
Oh you sneaky, sneaky girl. I love this!! What a wonderful surprise inside. I’m pretty sure bacon makes just about everything better. 🙂
Wow, sounds amazing with the addition of fleur de sel and bacon, awesome!
What? You mean I didn’t win! ARGH! 😉
I still haven’t tried the bacon in sweet foods yet, but I have a recipe in mind for it…soon!
This looks amazing! I’ve always wanted to try the chocolate and bacon recipe, very daring of you but it seems like a delicious result 🙂
oh my…i love you for your crazy macaron ideas and execution…
ahhh it’s terribly hot here.
and now don be upset i’m back so soooon from my break ehehe
I have a secret… I’ve never in my life had a macaroon!!! I know, I know, I feel deprived myself! I just might have to try my hand at these someday as they look incredible!
What a genius idea! Love this chocolate and bacon combination… especially in a macaron. I’m sure it was divine!
I am always impressed by how awesome you macarons look! Great idea with the chocolate and bacon pairing. So not a traditional macaron flavor, which makes it all the better!
Bacon in anything is good. Bacon and chocolate sounds divine. Wish I’d been there to try them!
I bet some of those dressed up people were wishing they had on your comfy slippers. I think that these macarons sound divine.
Love the French tradition on April Fool’s…too funny! And you might have convinced me to try this new flavor combination…your macarons look exquisite as always~
This story is so fun! I love the last image with the poisson 🙂 And I’m totally interested in making bacon macarons now!
I love the sweet salty combo of bacon and chocolate…a great little April Fool’s trick. So happens April 1st is my mom’s birthday so I always give her a small joke gift with her real gift…no tricks.
That’s a great photo of a guffaw about to explode! I am intrigued by your choc/bacon partnership. I love sweet and salty so this is one I’ve got to try.
Oh my goodness, chocolate and bacon macarons, I can almost taste the sweet and salty flavour. Nothing worse than fancy dress snobs who BUY their costumes, home made is always best!
Bacon??? Well, not being a fan of bacon, I’m not sure this one is for me. However… Liv tired some chocolate covered bacon at the fair last year and adored it! She described it as a “salty chocolate” not much bacon flavor. So maybe your are indeed on to something!! I’m not going to tell her about this one for a few days or she will want to put bacon in our Vanilla Macarons, and I want Vanilla!! (Yep… this one is all about me!!)
Congratulations to the winners!!!
Congrats to the winners!
These macarons are awesome. Chocolaty salty bacon…mmm. I wouldn’t be able to wait 36 hours to eat these, you are crazy!
Chocolate and bacon is a wonderful combination! Perfect for a macaron!
I love that you showed up in your pj’s and slippers! How fun, and comfortable!
I am a fan of the bacon chocolate combo … these macarons would be eaten up by me, and all me… now if I can just make them look as perfect as yours.
Congrats to all the winners … you are going to LOVE this book!
xoxo
I love the little chocolate fish in the photo of the cookies. What a neat idea to put something between macarons.
Oh man! What a surprise!
I love your story about Poisson d’avril. I’ll be careful tomorrow! These macrons are amazing, dark chocolate and bacon. You are “Mad About Macrons.”
Thes macaroons sound amaing! I can only imagine how vibrant the chocolate flavor is with the salty bacon! They are beautiful as well :)!
Hahaha in Italy we call it the same: pesce d’aprile and we too pin the paper fish on people’s backs! 🙂
These macarons are so intriguing. I love chocolate and I love bacon… I would love to try them! 🙂
Hugs Jill!