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Cocoanut Macaroons
Whip stiff the whites of three eggs and add a cup of powdered sugar, beating till very light. Flavour with almond or vanilla and add half a pound of desiccated cocoanut, then mix and drop on buttered paper or tins. If fresh cocoanut is used take half a pound of sugar and as much cocoanut as required for "body."
A meringue-based macaroon with no oven temperature or time given, which is the one thing the original assumes you know. Everything else is straightforward.
- Oven and timeBake in a slow to moderate oven, 300-325F, for 20-25 minutes, until the peaks are pale gold and the bases lift cleanly. Higher heat browns the coconut before the interior sets.
- Powdered sugarIn books of this period "powdered sugar" usually means finely granulated caster sugar rather than the cornstarch-cut confectioners' sugar sold today. Caster dissolves into the whites and gives a chewier macaroon; modern confectioners' sugar will work but bakes drier.
- Desiccated cocoanutDesiccated coconut means dried coconut, though period packaged brands were not always unsweetened, so check what you have. If you substitute the sweetened flaked coconut common in supermarkets, you may want to cut the sugar to about two-thirds of a cup, or the mixture can weep syrup on the tray.
- ProportionsThree egg whites, one cup sugar and half a pound (8 oz) of coconut gives a very stiff paste that holds a mound. If it slumps, add coconut a spoonful at a time rather than more sugar.
- The fresh-coconut variantFresh grated coconut carries far more moisture, hence the instruction to add "as much as required for body." Work it in until the mixture stands in a heap on the spoon; expect to need noticeably more than 8 oz.
- FlavouringUse a scant teaspoon of vanilla or a quarter-teaspoon of almond extract. Almond flavouring of this period was generally based on bitter-almond oil and its strength varied between makers, so add it cautiously and taste.
- Buttered paperParchment does the job of the buttered paper and does it better. Buttered metal tins encourage the sugary bases to catch and stick.
- Yield and keepingAbout two dozen macaroons dropped by rounded teaspoon. Cool on the paper, then store airtight; they soften within a day or two, which many people prefer.
The macaroon began as an almond-and-egg-white confection of Italian and French pastry work, the name traced to the Italian maccherone, and it reached English kitchens as a small, chewy almond cake baked on paper. Coconut entered the formula in the nineteenth century, when commercially dried and shredded coconut became cheap and shelf-stable in Britain and the United States and cooks found it behaved much like ground almonds in a meringue paste. That is why the recipe bothers to distinguish between desiccated and fresh coconut at all: the packaged product was the new convenience, and the fresh nut, still sold whole in city markets, was the awkward alternative requiring judgment rather than a weight.