Mmm... macarons

I am crazy in love with macarons. I have been meaning to make some for the longest time, but have been somewhat daunted by their complicated-ness and the fact that the best recipes are either in French (in which I am, how you say, out of practice) or dictate the ingredients in weight measurements (um, do you have 125g of egg whites?). I thought I bought all the ingredients the other day, but discovered I am fresh out of castor sugar and parchment paper. Since I'm taking too long to make my own, I cheated and satisfied my sweet (1/8th French) tooth with a few from La Baguette Et L'echalote on Granville Island.

SO GOOD! Especially the lemon ones. Light, crispy meringues with lemon cream sandwiched between. I don't think it can get any better than that! I love meringue, in any form. I am known to whip up extra when making lemon meringue pies just so that I can (oh so elegantly) eat it right out of the mixing bowl, raw. When I was doing this last week I wondered why I like it so much - I mean, I don't find the concept of raw egg whites appetizing...

I enjoyed one yesterday after Jamie and I took Cole on a walk to Granville Island. We had a great fall day, walking, checking out the exhibits at Emily Carr, visiting Opus (dropping hints for Santa), playing Santa for Coley at Knotty Toys and generally having a great time. We took the ferry back, which is always a good short cut, since it docks about five minutes from our doorstep. Cole enjoyed looking at the water and boats, and we even saw a seal.

We went strolling today along the seawall on the opposite side of the creek and ended up taking the ferry across to pick up some brooch fasteners at the bead shop for my crafty projects and unsurprisingly found myself tempted again. I brought two more home and promptly set about making tea and digging out a fancy teacup to accompany my treats.