What would the first week of Advent be without a little holiday baking? We always wanted to test-drive a coconut macaroon. And, over the past few months, we did so. Today’s the day we go from test-drive to license-to-thrill.
Here’s our best-ever recipe for the Chocolate-Dipped Coconut Macaroons we’ll be making today. It’s a slightly lower sugar, higher protein adaptation of an Ina Garten recipe, with the added pleasure of a dip into the dark side – the dark chocolate side, that is. [Don’t you just love Ina? Isn’t her new book, Cooking for Jeffrey, on your extremely long, extremely necessary Christmas List of Cookbooks, too?] Of course, you can use whatever kind of chocolate you want for dipping. Or, you can festivus them up by adding a wee bit of peppermint extract to the coconut mixture and dipping the freshly-dipped-in-chocolate macaroon in crushed candy canes!
Chocolate-Dipped Coconut Macaroons
Ingredients
- 1 400 g bag [4 1/2 generous cups] Unsweetened Shredded Coconut [Yes you can use sweetened coconut instead!]
- 1 300 ml can Sweetened Condensed Milk MINUS 25ml [2 tbs]
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 4 egg whites [we use xlarge eggs and save the yolks for eggnog]
- 16 oz or 2 cups of chocolate chips or chunks [We used dark chocolate but use what you like!]
- Gear: 1 25ml shot glass or a small ice cream scoop or a spoon
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 325 F.
- Refrigerate or freeze the beater and bowl of a stand or hand mixer or a metal bowl and whisk.
- Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, stir the coconut, condensed milk, vanilla, and salt.
- In a mixer, with a hand mixer, or by hand, whip the eggwhites until they form stiff peaks.
- With a spatula, fold the egg whites into the large bowl of ingredients until just combined.
- With a 25ml shot glass, large spoon, or small ice cream scoop, drop the cookie dough onto the lined baking sheets. [We made nice mountains with the 25ml/small end of a double-ended shot glass.]
- Bake one batch at a time on the center rack!
- Bake each batch 22-24 minutes, rotating the pans once during baking, until lightly golden on tops and golden on the bottoms. [You can lift the parchment slightly to check.]
- Slide the cookies-on-parchment from the pan onto wire racks.
- Cool completely.
- In a heatproof bowl over boiling water or in the microwave on medium-low bursts, melt the chocolate and stir well.
- Line a baking pan or pans with parchment.
- Carefully dip the bottoms, tops, or 1/2 of each macaroon in chocolate and place on the lined pan to cool completely.
- Macaroons may be refrigerated on their pan for 30 minutes.
- Store the macaroons in an airtight container at room temperature for up to a week.
Notes
**Make these macaroons into Festive Mint Macaroons by adding 1/2 to 1 tsp peppermint extract to the dough and/or just after dipping the cooled macaroons in white or dark chocolate, dipping them in crushed candy canes or peppermint candies. Adapted from Ina Garten
Aren’t they amazing??
WOW!
Enjoy!