With a Good Macaroon, Peace on Earth Seems Possible

Carolyn Jung is the creator of the blog, FoodGal.com, and wrote this piece on Christmas cookies for Patch.

For the past 10 years, I have baked these cookies every Christmas.

And that's a very long time in cookie years.

But without these cookies, there would be mayhem, madness and rioting in the streets. Yes, that's how good these Italian macaroons are.

Every holiday season, my friends, family and co-workers wait in anticipation for these chewy-as-can-be, almond-potent cookies.

When I was the food writer at the San Jose Mercury News, I'd always bring these to the annual holiday potluck. They got to be so popular that colleagues would grab a cookie prior to lining up for the entrees, just to be sure they were able to get one before they all disappeared. After awhile, my co-workers even convinced me to bake TWO batches for every potluck. One year, a former copy editor who had moved to San Diego showed up at the annual potluck and joked that she'd journeyed back up to the Bay Area just to snag one of my macaroons.

These cookies have only four ingredients: sugar, egg whites, almond paste and slivered almonds. But together, they create a cookie that's festive, imbued with intense nuttiness and graced with a texture that's unforgettable.

The recipe is from Classic Home Desserts by the late-great food writer, Richard Sax. His original recipe, "Mary's Pignoli,'' calls for rolling cookies in pine nuts. But with the especially high oil content of pine nuts, that version makes for a cookie that's almost too rich. His alternative versions use sliced or slivered almonds instead. I like using the latter because they give these pale-golden cookies an almost snowflake-like look.

When shopping for almond paste, you'll likely find two different brands: Solo's canned almond paste (made in the United States) and Odense's log-shaped variety in a box (made in Denmark). Either will work fine. But I do prefer the Odense, because it's a little less sweet and firmer in texture, compared to the Solo one, which is softer and gooey. If using the Solo brand, just take care to incorporate the egg whites especially well into the almond paste-sugar mixture. 

Granted, these are not the most inexpensive cookies to make. A pound of almond paste alone will set you back about $13, not to mention the expense of a pound of slivered almonds, too.

But one bite will convince you it's worth it.

For the recipe for these "Italian Macaroons,'' see it here on the FoodGal site.  

Carolyn Jung is an award-winning food and wine writer based in Silicon Valley. She is the recipient of a James Beard award for feature writing about restaurants and chefs.