My Macaron Christmas Tree

The day before, prepare the ganache.

Cut the vanilla pod in two pieces in its length. Scrape the seeds.

Pour 50 g of cream in a saucepan. Add the honey, vanilla seeds and vanilla pod.

Heat until it boils. Stop heating immediately.

Leave to rest 10 to 15 minutes.

Remove the pod from the cream (try to extract as many seeds as possible).

Melt slowly the white chocolate.

When the chocolate is melted, heat again for a few seconds the cream.

Add it to the chocolate 1/3 after the other.

Add the 150 g of cream, mix.

Place a clingfilm directly on the mixture so that there's no air remaining.

Set aside in your fridge for the night.

The next day, prepare the macaron shells.

Mix the ground almond, icing sugar, icing color and 70 g egg whites in a large bowl. You should get a very compact mixture.

Start whisking the remaining egg whites.

In the meantime boil the water and caster sugar. When the syrup reaches 118 degrees (or when you have littles bubbles all over the surface), pour it gently on the egg whites while whisking.

Keep on whisking until the mixture gets below 50 degrees (you should be able to place your hands against the bowl without burning them).

Add a large tablespoon of this meringue to your almond batter and mix with the spatula.

Add 1/3 of the meringue and mix with the spatula.

Add another thrid of meringue and mix.

Add the last third and mix.

Mix gently until the batter surface flattens when you stop mixing. Be carefull, if you mix to much you won't get the right result after baking.

Pipe 4 shells with decreasing size on one baking sheet and 4 shells of smaller and also decreasing siez on another baking paper sheet.

Leave to dry 30 minutes.

Preheat your oven at 160 C / 320 F degrees.

Bake the small shells 18 minutes and the bigger ones 20 minutes. They shouldn't stick to the paper. If not, bake a bit more.

Place your shells on a grid for cooling down. Set aside.

Place the bowl and whisk in your freezer for a few minutes.

When the bowl is cold, pour the ganache inside and whisk for a few minutes. You should get a firm and compact ganache.

Garnish immediately your largest macaron shell.

Place the second largest on top and garnish with ganache.

Go on until you put the last shell.

Add silver sugar pearls.

Set aside in your fridge until serving.