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These raspberry macarons are tangy, sweet, and melt-in-your-mouth amazing! Since my trip to Portland when I tried raspberry Macarons at one of their famous bakeries, I became obsessed with recreating the ones I tried. They were in-sanely good. So I’ve made hundreds of macarons over the past month.
I also knew that we needed to make a video to share the recipe with you because it’s crazy important for you to see what “flowing like lava” really means. I adopted the macaron base and stirring method from Martha Stewart’s March 2014 Living Magazine because it seems to be the most fail proof.
I admit there were several moments of near pulling my hair out over the past few weeks as I tested and retested batch after batch after batch, but I was stubborn as tree sap on my favorite blouse, and let me tell you, it was worth it! Mastering these cookies made me feel like a baking ninja. I’m sharing ALL my secrets to success so hopefully you’ll get it right off the bat! Before you get excited and start, READ THIS:
Watch How to Make Macarons:
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How to Make Great Macarons (Tips for Success):
- Read through the recipe first, watch the video, and measure out all of your ingredients before starting.
- Weigh your almond meal and confectioners sugar. When I use store-bought large AA eggs, I don’t weigh the whites or the granulated sugar since it’s an exact 1/4 cup granulated sugar.
- Do not use wax paper. Use parchment or silpat (but let the cookies cool before removing them or they will stick).
- If you store almond meal in the fridge, bring it to room temp. Egg whites must be room temp also.
- Do not overbeat egg whites – they should not be dry and breaking.
- Sift your dry ingredients; very important or your macarons might be hollow.
- When mixing your flour and meringue batter, Do not overmix or undermix: When you pipe the cookies, the peaks should settle down into themselves within 10 seconds.
- Let your cookies rest before baking – this is important to form the feet. Rest anywhere from 30 minutes to 1 hour
- When I bake in 2 batches, my first set always bakes in 15 min and the second one takes 13 min (maybe my oven gets hotter the second go-around?). Keep an eye on it. Cookies should not turn golden in the oven, except ever so slightly underneath.
- Cookies taste best the next day – refrigerate overnight and bring to room temp to serve.
- If you can’t find freeze dried raspberries, they are pretty inexpensive online.
- Deep Breath. YOU CAN DO IT! 🙂
- Watch our easy video tutorial on how to measure correctly
What You’ll Need to Make Raspberry Macarons:
- A digital kitchen scale
- A good food processor
- A spatula
- Parchment paper or silpat to line baking sheets
- Electric hand mixer or stand mixer (I prefer the hand mixer for more control)
- A sieve to sift flour and strain raspberries
- A pastry piping bag with a large round tip (a disposable bag will do and if you’re brave, you can make due with cutting the tip off to make a round 3/8″ tip – I’ve seen it done)
- This little dusting wand from OXO is really fun to use
Here is the Print friendly recipe for how to make macarons:
Raspberry Macarons Recipe (Video Tutorial)

Ingredients
Ingredients for Macarons:
- 70 grams about 2/3 cup almond meal/flour
- 120 grams about 1 cup confectioners (powdered) sugar
- 2 large egg whites, about 65 grams, room temp
- 50 grams exactly 1/4 cup leveled granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup freeze dried raspberries
Ingredients for Raspberry Buttercream:
- 3/4 cup fresh or frozen raspberries
- 3 tbsp granulated sugar
- 1 Tbsp lemon juice
- 6 Tbsp unsalted butter, room temp
Instructions
How to Make Raspberry Macarons: Prep: Line 1 XL or 2 regular baking sheets with parchment paper or silpat.
- In the bowl of a good food processor, combine almond meal and powdered sugar and pulse twice to combine then process for 1 1/2 min. Sift through a sieve into a large bowl, pressing down on clumps with the back of a spoon. You should have about 1/2 to 1 Tbsp of solids left over in the sieve - discard those (If you have alot more, pulse them a few more times in the food processor).
- Place 2 egg whites in a large bowl and beat until foamy. Gradually add 1/4 cup sugar then increase to high speed and beat 2 1/2 min or until stiff glossy peaks form.
- Add sifted almond mixture and fold with spatula from the bottom of the bowl upward then press the flat side of your spatula firmly through the middle. Repeat until batter flows like lava and thick ribbons form as it flows off the spatula. (35-40 complete strokes).
- Fit a pastry bag with a large (3/8" wide) round tip and transfer batter inside. Pipe 3/4" round cookies onto the lined baking sheet, keeping them 1" apart. Drop the sheets 6" over the counter to release air bubbles about 15-20 times.
- Place freeze dried raspberries in a ziploc bag and crush them with a rolling pin until they are a powder. Use a small sifter or tea ball to dust the tops of the cookies with raspberry powder. Let cookies sit at room temp at least 30 min or until they form a thin film over the top and don't stick to your finger when poked. Meanwhile, complete steps 1 & 2 of the frosting (see below).
- While cookies are resting, Preheat Oven to 300˚F with rack in the center. Bake 15 min. If they didn't all fit on one sheet, bake in two separate batches. Slide parchment paper and cookies onto the counter right away and cool to room temp (15 min). Now you can finish off step 3 of the frosting and pipe frosting generously onto half of your macaroons and sandwich gently with the second cookie shell.
How to Make the Raspberry Buttercream Frosting:
- In a small sauce pan over medium heat, combine 3/4 cup raspberries, 3 Tbsp granulated sugar and 1 Tbsp lemon juice. Heat until bubbling.
- Mash up the raspberries with a spoon then push the mixture through a sieve, pressing on the raspberry seeds to get the most juice out. I got 1/3 cup syrup. Keep the syrup/juice and discard seeds. Let cool to room temp.
- In a medium bowl, beat 6 Tbsp butter until whipped and white (2 min on high), Add in room temp raspberry syrup and beat until whipped and fluffy (2 1/2 to 3 min on high). You can add powdered sugar to taste if a sweeter cream is preferred.
Notes
If you make this recipe, I’d love to see pics of your creations on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter! Hashtag them #natashaskitchen
I love that these raspberry macarons are sweet and sour – I find them irresistible. Do you have a favorite macaron flavor?
Hi, i was wondering if you can make a hazelnut chocolate macaroon sometime. I’ve seen so many recipes but am kinda scared to try it. I love the way to explain everything .
I will put it on my list of recipes to research and develop (but I have to warn you, it’s a very long list) :-O. Thanks for the suggestion!
okay! thank you so much!
Hi Natasha, Thank you for your recipe! It was very helpful and my macarons turned out! Do you have any other macaron recipes? I’m wanting to try other flavours.
Anita, thank you for the nice review 😀. I might have another recipe before the Valentine’s day so stay tuned.
Hi Natasha.
Just want to ask for a tip. We have a gas stove and I was wondering if the baking tempatu same or lower? Thank you.
Hi Alina, I can’t really guess without testing it in your oven first. Do you know if your oven tends to run on the hotter side in most recipes? Do you have a glass oven door so you could look in on the macarons? Gas ovens generally don’t give off uniform heat the way that electric ovens do. If you see that your macarons puff up right away, that means they are rising too fast so you’ll need to reduce the heat slightly. Again, it’s difficult to guess, but I’d suggest you do the same temperature and keep an eye on it.
Hi Natasha, raspberries, dried or just frozen? Thank you
It’s actually both, Freeze Dried Raspberries can be found in most of the super markets.
Hi Natasha!
This was my first time making them and they turned out amazing! Thank you! However, I didn’t have a food processor so I tried one of the blenders that you recommended and it didnt work, so I simply used a hand mixer which did the trick! Again thank you for the amazing recipe:)
HI Diana, thank you for your feedback. Were you using the blender for the nuts or are you talking about the egg whites portion? If you were using, the blender for the nuts, what brand was it? Thank you so much! 🙂
What’s the best way to store these?
I put them in tupperware and refrigerate – they stay good in the fridge for at least a week.
I am so upset this recipe didn’t work for me. Watched the video 3 times. Did everything by directions. They ended up all cracked :(. So sad! I tried different recipes before and usually got good results. Wonder what I did wrong? My sister thinks I should not use organic eggs, she never has success with those. What do you think about that? I did tap them agains the counter top for 10 times and popped all the obvious bubbles that were still left. I know there can be lots of pain. 🙁
Hi Inna, did you let the macarons rest on the counter for the recommended time before baking them? That usually helps alot with cracking. Also, I’m not sure about the organic eggs. If they are homegrown eggs, they will vary in size quite a bit so I’d recommend store-bought ones to have a uniform amount of egg whites. Is there anything else you may have changed or omitted in the recipe that you can think of? I hope my reply is helpful to you.
Yes, they were resting for 30 min, also I used the Costco organic eggs. I will give it a try with regular eggs. If it’s a fail it’s a fail and I will bake others stuff with less stress! 🙈 Macaroons dislike me for some reason!
Keep me posted Inna 😊
Hi,
I’ve had problems in the past with cracked macarons. With really high humidity in the summer they take a long time to crust. Sometimes not at all in that 30min-1hour. I turn the kitchen fan on and they crust quickly. now I do it anyways just so I can bake them quicker.
Thank you for sharing that tip for high humidity areas!
Hello!
I just made these and the tops cracked and no feet were formed:/ Not sure what I did wrong. Although, they taste very good!
Hi Lidia, I’m so glad you enjoyed the taste of them! I’m always happy to troubleshoot since after all my testing, I feel like I’ve encountered pretty much every problem with these cookies :). Did you have a chance to watch the video? Also, did you make sure to do every step without skipping anything? The main culprits with cracking and no feet are not tapping out the air bubbles and not letting them rest on the counter prior to baking. I hope that helps 🙂
The cookies just finished baking and the raspberry powder is all brown:(
But we baked them for 15 min. on 300 degrees F.
What happened?!
Svetlana, did you bake them in the center of the oven? It sounds like your oven runs a little hot. You may try lowering it to 280 or 290 next time. I’ve had that happen with second batches that go in right after the first because my oven is always hotter the second time around.
Hi just tried making macaroons for the first time came out delicious! Thank you! Question do you put your silpat directly in the oven or put it on a cookie sheet and then in oven?
Lena, thank you for such a nice review 😀 . I place silpat on the cookie sheet and then in the oven.
I followed your recipe to the letter & they came out perfectly except the freeze dried raspberry dusting turned brown when done. It remained red up until the last 4 min of baking. Any suggestions? 300 degree oven. I tried it several times and each time the raspberry dusting turned brown.
Hi Marie, it sounds like maybe your oven runs a little hot. Try reducing the temperature 15 degrees and see if that solves the issue. 🙂
Hi i followed your recepie everything turned out great but when I put them in the oven they crack what can be the problem????
Did you tap them on the counter to release the air and then let them rest at least 30 minutes before baking? Were there any steps you might have skipped?
Quick question-what if i don’t have a food processor?
Do you have a good blender such as blendtec or vitamix? Those should work well to turn it into a super fine flour. I haven’t tried it in a magic bullet or anything else so I’m not sure if that would grind it finely enough. Another thing that might work is a very very clean and dry coffee grinder, but you will have to do it in a few batches.
Oh yes! We have the vitamix blender! Ok thank you!
Hello Natasha, I’m Argentina, and I’m delighted with your recipes !!!! would like to test these macarrons. I need to ask you a question: at what point I can add food coloring ?. Thank you very much and congratulations !!
Hi Silvina, I haven’t tried food coloring in this one but if I did, I would put it in at step 3 where you fold the flour and egg whites together. You want to use a gel food coloring so the mixture doesn’t get runny and add just a little at a time.
What if i don’t have a kitchen scale are the other measurements exact?
HI Diana, the 2 ingredients that really need to be weighed on a kitchen scale are the almond meal and the powdered sugar. If you don’t weigh, you will always end up with a different amount of these ingredients because it can vary greatly by how they are packed. You will run the risk of them not turning out the same. The first time I made macarons (3 years ago), I did not weigh my ingredients and I failed and it kept me from trying them again for a long time. That was my experience anyways :).
Natasha, these look really good, amazing photography by the way!
Thank you so much for the compliment 🙂
Thank you so much for the recipe! I’ve just made these for the third time and came out perfect every time! Love these! Your video is excellent, very thorough and perfect size! Just for fun I’ve substituted mascarpone cheese for the butter, yet kept the respberry syrup portions and it turned out great, I bearly use butter, so the cheese was hit closer home to my taste buds!:-) thank you again!
I’m so happy you loved the macarons! I’m also really happy that you were successful in making them. I shared this recipe in hopes that it would save others time and trouble by not having to experiment as much s I did. Thanks for sharing that with me! Also, I love your idea with substituting mascarpone for butter. Did you use the same amount of mascarpone? Someone else asked me about substituting butter but I hadn’t tested anything besides butter myself. Thanks Nadia! 🙂
Me these puppies today. Followed instructions exactly and watched the video. Came out perfect! Iv tried so many diffrent recipes and this one is a keeper. Thank you!!
Irina, thank you for such a great review, I’m so happy you like them 😀.
I made these macarons and did not really succeed. Mine turned out very nice on the outside but very hollow on the inside. What a bummer. It is a delicious cookie but I just haven’t mastered it yet! I will keep on trying. I also filled mine with lemon curd… yum!
I made at leat 5 batches that were hollow before I figured out that I had to sift the flour which solved the problem. Are you sifting?
Yes, I did sift! I might try sifting twice next time to see if that will solve the issue!
What kind of sifter did you use? If you use ones with holes that are too large, you’ll still get the larger pieces in your almond flour mixture. Is there anything else you did differently from what I showed in the video?
Are the freeze dried rasberrys optional?
The macarons will still work out without them, the freeze dried raspberries just add some raspberry flavor to the shells and they are prettier in pink 🙂
ok thank you! 🙂
Natasha, do you have a recipe for sugar cookies? The ones were you can use cookie cutters to make with kids? And also any healthy recipes for the decorative frosting ? thanks! (christmas is coming up)
Olesya, I don’t have anything like that currently but that’s a great suggestion. If I come up with anything, I’ll be sure to share it 😀 .