I heart Music - Matcha Elaichi (Cardamom) and Nutella Mascarpone Macaroons

I remember my mum yelling "Turn down the volume" while my TV played Bon Jovi's "It's my life..It's now or never..I ain't gonna live forever..I just want to live while I'm alive"... volume turned way up to shatter the glasses around. I was a rebel at home and maybe that's why I loved songs like this that portrayed my state of mind (or maybe the high octane video). So wherever we travelled my precious vinyl collection travelled with me (although I have managed to lose quite a lot of my favourites).Music was always a big part of us back home. All our bollywood films have at least a dozen songs (yes even till date this hasn't changed) and they were played in the buses, autos (tuk-tuk... a 3 wheeled chauffer driven ferrari for the poor) we travelled...at weddings and the parties we went to. Then there was MTV and Channel [V] to play our favourite numbers day in and day out. It is difficult for me to say my favourites as they keep changing but there are some evergreen ones like Bon Jovi, the Beatles, Scorpions, Billy Joel, George Michael, ABBA, Micheal Bolton, A.R Rehman...

A hopeless romantic at heart, I always dreamt that my MAN would play guitar, sing my favourite songs to me and we would have candle light dinners on special occasions...Well that pretty much didn't happen..You see Mr. S cant sing or play guitar but I am lucky that he does likes music and has a similar taste...Thank god for that at least we dont have keep fighting and ejecting CDs on our long drives..And Thank god we still do candle light dinners..

This month the MACTweets sweethearts and MACQueens Deeba and Jamie have asked us to create a MAC inspired, by our favourite song...So here it is my totally crazy and rebellious like me Matcha-Cardamon and Nutella Mascarpone Macaroon.. inspired by Bon Jovi's It's my life...

I love the mix of cardamom in my daily dose of chai and have incorporated the same flavour with matcha in my macaroons. I also love nutella and this time instead of slathering the macaroons with plain nutella I made it a little lighter with mascarpone. 

Ingredients

Ground Almonds 75gms

Powdered Sugar 75 gms

Egg whites 50 gms divided

Caster Sugar 75 gms

Water 25 gms

Matcha green tea powder 1/2 tsp

Cardamom powder 1/2 tsp

Green food colour

Method:

Make a heart shaped template using heart shaped cookie cutter onto a parchment sheet. Place a silpat on this.

Sift the ground almonds, matcha, cardamom powder at least twice and sift the powdered sugar. Set aside. Whisk 25gms egg whites till peaks form and heat the caster sugar with water until soft stage (110C). Pour the syrup in a steady stream, into the the peaks beating all the time until glossy peaks form. Add the colour at this point and whisk. Now mix the 25gms whites to the almond powder mixture and gently fold the almond mixture into the glossy whites mixture. Transfer this into a piping bag and pipe onto the parchment paper using the stencil. Bake at 150C for about 12-14 min depending on the size of your macaroons. Mine were quite big.

Nutella Mascarpone filling

Nutella 4tbsp

Mascarpone 4 tbsp

Method:

Whisk the mascarpone till light and blend in the nutella.

Assembly:

Take two heart-shaped mascarpone similar in size and spread a little of the nutella-mascarpone mixture and sandwich. Store in the refrigerator for a few hours until set.