Featured books

Featured Websites

.: Reader Views Kids

Provides book reviews, by kids, for kids

.: Inside Scoop Live

Provides live author interviews for podcast

.: Authors Access

Provides interviews with experts in the publishing industry

.: Midwest Book Review

Provides post-publication reviews

.: Reader Views

Provides book reviews and author publicity

.: LR Communication Design

Provides professional website design and development

.: Blogging Authors

Provides a place where writers and readers meet

.: Review The Book

Provides 5 books reviews on 10 different sites

.: Best Sellers World

Provides book reviews and author features

.: Feathered Quill Book Reviews

Provides book reviews and author features

reviews

Macaron Magic

Jialin Tian, Ph.D.
Jayca Inc. (2011)
ISBN 9780983776406
Reviewed by Kam Aures for Rebecca’s Reads (09/11)

If there ever was an interesting background for a cookbook author then this is it.  “A NASA research engineer by day, a pastry enthusiast by night, Jialin Tian developed a passion for making pastries while she was working on her doctoral dissertation on the reconstruction of irregularly sampled interferograms in imaging Fourier transform spectrometry.  Since then the art of pastry making has brought her endless enjoyment.”  (back cover)

What first drew me in was the cover of the book.  The photograph of the rainbow colored macarons stacked really caught my eye and I couldn’t wait to learn how to make them.  The beautiful, mouth-watering photographs weren’t just reserved for the cover of the book; the inside is filled with these pictures of delectable goodness as well!

Tian starts off the book by giving step-by-step recipes and photographs for the basic techniques.  The most difficulty I had here was in finding one of the ingredients and that was the dried egg white powder.  I eventually found a store in the area that carried it but it was at a premium price.  These macarons looked worth it though and the jar would also last awhile so I went for it.

I followed the directions exactly for the macaron shell and although I was a little nervous that they wouldn’t turn out I was pleasantly surprised when they did.  There are many factors which go into making a great macaron and you get so much more information out of Tian’s book than you would get from just looking up a recipe. 

Another recipe I tried out of Tian’s book was the Chocolate Ganache.  Let me tell you the filling was absolutely delicious!  My favorite recipe though was the one for Mocha Caramel Macarons.  The mocha caramel buttercream filling consisting of sugar, water, espresso, salt and unsalted butter, was so tasty.  I can’t wait to test out more of the different varieties!

Making macarons is a very time consuming process, in fact some of the ingredients you need to get prepared the day before.  However, the results are definitely worth it and if you have the patience I recommend giving these little bits of goodness a try!

.: Blog
.: FTC Disclosure