Monday Macaron

So I’ve had this luster dust sitting on my counter for many days now, staring me in the eye and asking, “When are you actually going to do something with me?”

Today was the day. With the holidays coming up, I’m realizing that the sugar flower project will probably be a springtime thing, and I’m not baking many cakes. But enter this Pinterest photo:

I love macarons, and I love shiny things. Ergo, love at first site. Now, I’m not crazy enough to try to attempt any DIY macaron baking projects, wedding-related or not (I attempted macarons once and it was an unmitigated disaster). I AM enough of a glutton for punishment to want to always add some extra dumb little touch, though.

So this Pinterest picture is captioned, “Gold painted macarons with gold luster dust,” and links to a listing for gold luster dust. I don’t buy it- these macarons are almost definitely decorated with edible gold leaf. Look how shiny it is! Based on my expertise (read: Google image searches for “gold luster dust”), luster dust will give you a metallic shimmer, but it’s not going to give you the almost mirror-finish that these guys have. It’s a Pinterest fail waiting to happen.

But you know what? The caption worked because I bought luster dust anyway. I’m not brave or fancy enough to venture into the edible gold leaf (what does this look like, Serendipity?)- also, eating actual gold has always struck me as a giant middle finger to poverty-stricken people everywhere. Fancy French cookies with FAKE gold is only a tiny step below that, but you know- I’m a bad person.

Macarons are stupidly expensive, but because they are delicate and come in pretty colors and weird flavors like rose and lavender, people don’t really seem to balk- myself included. I’m like, “Yeah, $2.50 for a two-bite cookie that might taste like hand soap- seems reasonable.” You also don’t want the French to think you’re cheap. However, since I’ve never used luster dust before and wanted to err on the side of caution, I bought frozen macarons from Trader Joe’s. $5 for a dozen, can you believe it? A lower investment for an experiment is almost never a bad thing.

After letting the macarons thaw at room temp for about 45 minutes, I mixed up a tiny pinch of antique bronze luster dust with a couple drops of gin (I’m pretty sure there’s an alcohol specifically made for this task, but I have only gin, whiskey, and absinthe on hand, so the clearest one won). Use only the tiniest amount of alcohol- the luster dust goes on more opaquely when there’s a higher concentration of dust to solvent. I used a paintbrush to apply the designs. I’m sure there’s a TON of potential for fun stencil or stamping applications- but you have to walk before you run, right?

I think the luster dust looks best in a tone-on-tone application- a more subtle contrast is prettier. The yellow macaron with this coppery bronze luster dust looks like a clown outfit to me. Also clutch  is to have a mix of painted and unpainted macarons. You know the saying- if everything is special, then nothing is. I think that’s part of what’s so appealing about the gold-leaf Pinterest macarons, too. The plain macarons only served to make the painted ones seem that much more beautiful and spectacular. So life lessons were learned all around.

And guess what? The Trader Joe’s macarons were not half bad! For being a fifth of the price of a boutique macaron, these were definitely way more than a fifth as delicious. I know this because I ate four of them in rapid succession. The pistachio was far and away the best- but honestly, the texture was pretty good on all of the ones I tried. I was pretty impressed.  I didn’t read the box before scarfing them down, though, so I assumed this pinky one was raspberry- berry flavors usually rank near the top for me when it comes to desserts, so I saved it for last. When I took a bite, I was all “Blegh! This is a terrible raspberry!” That’s because it was actually fig. So it was a terrible raspberry macaron, but an alright fig one.