Vegan Italian Meringue Macarons

We’ve definitely had our fair share of failures with vegan macarons. After experimenting with different types of aquafaba meringue for the frosting on our Dominican cake, we decided to give vegan Italian meringue macarons a try. Italian meringue involves pouring hot sugar syrup into the whipped aquafaba, as opposed to adding granulated sugar for French meringue. Also, if you’re unfamiliar with aquafaba, it’s just the liquid left over from cooking chickpeas. It’s usually taken from canned chickpeas. We also have a recipe for vegan French meringue macarons.

These vegan Italian meringue macarons can be easily adapted to different flavors and colors. Just add whichever ones you’d like. This recipe also contains information on how to make a basic chocolate ganache or Italian meringue butter cream for the filling. Feel free to use this recipe just for the macarons and use any filling of your choice. The filling pictured here is actually store-bought coconut milk chocolate hazelnut spread from Charm School Chocolate.

Make sure to check out the recipe notes for additional information and tips.

If you try this recipe, leave us a comment below to let us know how it goes. We would love to hear from you!

Vegan Italian Meringue Macarons

Little Lighthouse Baking Co.

Crispy yet chewy almond cookie shells with a sweet filling. Made using Italian aquafaba meringue.

3 from 1 vote

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Prep 45 minutes mins

Cook 15 minutes mins

Rest 1 hour hr 30 minutes mins

Total 2 hours hrs 30 minutes mins

Course Dessert

Cuisine French, Vegan

Servings 30 macarons

Equipment

• electric hand mixer or stand mixer
• silicone baking mat
• candy thermometer
• kitchen scale

Ingredients  

Macarons

• 108 grams almond flour
• 100 grams powdered sugar
• 100 ml aquafaba (split into 50ml and 50ml)
• 115 grams granulated sugar (½ cup + 2 tbsp)
• ¼ cup water
• ¼ tsp cream of tartar
• gel food coloring (optional)

Italian Meringue Buttercream (makes about 2 cups)

• 50 ml aquafaba
• 115 grams granulated sugar
• ¼ cup water
• ¼ tsp cream of tartar
• 160 grams room temperature vegan butter (about ⅔ cup)

Chocolate Ganache

• 60 grams vegan chocolate (about 1 candy bar)
• 1 ½ tbsp unsweetened soy milk (20g)

Instructions 

Prepare the ingredients.

• Measure out all your ingredients and gather all your equipment.
• Sift the almond flour and powdered sugar together using a fine mesh sieve. Do this twice. It's fine if there are some larger almond chunks that don't make it through.
  

Make the almond flour paste.

• Mix in 50ml of aquafaba into the almond flour mixture until it forms a smooth paste. Set aside.
  

Make the Italian meringue.

• Add the granulated sugar and water to a small sauce pan on low heat. We want to heat the sugar to 240-245°F. It will be syrup-like, but not caramelized. While it is heating, whip up the aquafaba.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer, or a large mixing bowl, add 50ml of aquafaba and ¼ tsp of cream of tartar.
  
• Whisk on high speed until stiff peaks form. It will go from bubbly, to foamy, to a glossy foam.

  For us, it's always significantly quicker to whisk the aquafaba with an electric hand mixer. It usually takes us no longer than 5 minutes to whip it to stiff peaks. We whisk it in the same bowl as the bowl of the stand mixer, and then attach the bowl back to the stand mixer when we pour in the sugar syrup. Mixing the aquafaba in a stand mixer takes longer for us. Don't go by the time, but by the look of the aquafaba. If it takes you a longer amount of time, turn off or lower the heat on your pot of sugar until you are ready to use it.
  
• Once the sugar reaches 240°, turn off the heat. Slowly and carefully stream in the sugar down the side of the mixing bowl while the aquafaba continues to whisk on high speed. Try to avoid pouring over the whisk because it will send most of the sugar flying to the sides of the bowl rather than into the aquafaba. The sugar will also be extremely hot and any splashes could burn you. It's okay for there to be some sugar that remains in the pot that can't be poured out. Don't worry about the specks and drops of sugar on the sides of the mixing bowl either.
• Continue to whisk on high speed until the bowl of the mixer is cool to the touch. It will be extremely hot when you first pour in the sugar. Our bowl cooled down between 2-3 minutes. You will see the aquafaba become really glossy and start to thicken as it gets mixed. This is the Italian meringue.
  

Make the macaron batter.

• Add half of the Italian meringue to the almond flour paste from earlier.
  
• Fold it in gently until fully incorporated. That means instead of mixing the bowl vigorously, you mix by scooping from underneath and then over several times.
  
• Now add in the rest of the Italian meringue. Fold the mixture until it is fully incorporated and the consistency of the batter runs off the spatula in ribbons. Don't mix too much or you will remove too much air from the batter. If you want to color your shells, you can add in gel food coloring now.
  
• We took part of the batter and colored it brown to attempt a swirled pattern, but it was mixed together more than we would have liked once we added it to the piping bag.
  
• Add your mixture to a piping bag with about a ¼ inch opening. You can tie off the end of the bag by the tip and place it into a tall glass or container to help you fill it.
  
• Place the silicone baking mat on a baking tray. We used two half sheet baking trays. And we turned the trays upside down for better heat distribution.

Pipe the macarons shells.

• Holding the piping bag vertical to the baking tray, gently squeeze the bag to allow the batter to run out and form circles about 1 to 1.5 inches wide. Ours were about 1.5 inches wide and we were able to make about 60 shells for 30 macarons. The amount you'll be able to make will depend on the size of the circles you pipe.
  
• Carefully smack the tray down several times onto a flat surface to allow any air bubbles to come to the surface and escape. If there are any still remaining that won't budge, you can pop them with a small sewing needle. Big bubbles in your macarons could cause the shells to have an uneven appearance after baking.
• Allow the macarons to rest until a skin forms on them and you can touch them without getting any batter on your finger. The amount of time this takes will depend on the temperature and humidity of your space. For us, it took about an hour.
• Preheat your oven to 310° around the final minutes of your macarons drying.

Bake.

• Place the macarons on the middle rack of your oven and bake for 15-20 minutes. The tops should be firm. The shells will have risen a bit and you will see what are called "feet". This is the bumpy or frilly part underneath the smooth top of the shell.
  
• IMPORTANT: Allow the macarons to cool for at least 30 minutes. If you try to remove them from the baking tray too early, the sugar will still be sticky and warm. The macarons will rip as you pull them from the tray. Always wait until they are fully cooled. If there are any shells that you don't like the appearance of, you can test to see if the macarons are ready by pulling those off first haha.

  This is what the bottom of ours looked like.
  

Fill.

• The last step is to fill the macarons. This will be more or less work depending on what kind of filling you are using or if you are using something pre-made. Continue reading below for an Italian meringue buttercream recipe and a chocolate ganache recipe.
  
• Match up the shells by size. You can pipe your filling onto the bottom of one shell and then finish the sandwich with another shell. It's commonly recommended to refrigerate macarons for 24 hours before eating them, but you can also eat them once you finish making them.
  

Italian Meringue Buttercream Recipe.

• We followed all the same steps above for the Italian meringue used to make the macarons. Here they are again for convenience.

  Just like before, add the granulated sugar and water to a small sauce pan on low heat. We want to heat the sugar to 240-245°F. It will be syrup-like, but not caramelized. While it is heating, whip up the aquafaba.
• In the bowl of a stand mixer, or a large mixing bowl, add 50ml of aquafaba and ¼ tsp of cream of tartar.
  
• Whisk on high speed until stiff peaks form. It will go from bubbly, to foamy, to a glossy foam.
  
• Once the sugar reaches 240°, turn off the heat. Slowly and carefully stream in the sugar down the side of the mixing bowl while the aquafaba continues to whisk on high speed. Try to avoid pouring over the whisk because it will send more of the sugar flying to the sides of the bowl rather than into the aquafaba. The sugar will also be extremely hot and any splashes could burn you. It's okay for there to be some sugar that remains in the pot that can't be poured out. Don't worry about the specks and drops of sugar on the sides of the mixing bowl either.
• Continue to whisk on high speed until the bowl of the mixer is cool to the touch. It will be extremely hot when you first pour in the sugar. Our bowl cooled down between 2-3 minutes. You will see the aquafaba become really glossy and start to thicken as it gets mixed. This is the Italian meringue.
  
• Next, using room temperature butter, add about a tablespoon at a time to the Italian meringue. We just estimated it–sometimes we added more and sometimes we added less. Allow each addition of butter to fully incorporate into the meringue.
  
• Once all the butter is added, you should have a smooth and fluffy mixture. This is the Italian meringue buttercream. You can add in the flavorings or colors you would like at this point.
  
• You can add purple/violet gel food coloring to the buttercream to offset the yellow tint from the butter. This will make it appear a bit whiter. Use the smalled bit of coloring at a time. You can add it in with the tip of a toothpick or skewer.
  
• We added ½ tablespoon of instant coffee powder to our buttercream to fill some of our macarons.
  
• Here is what it looked like once it finished mixing.
  
• We placed the buttercream into a piping bag with a star-shaped tip and then piped the buttercream onto the bottom of a macaron shell. Finish the sandwich with a second shell on top.
  

Chocolate Ganache Recipe

• Microwave 1 bar (60 grams) of vegan milk chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave for 20 seconds at a time until melted. Heat 20 grams (approx. 1.5 tbsp) of soy milk. While stirring the chocolate, slowly pour in the milk until it becomes a smooth mixture. Place in the fridge to cool and thicken to a consistency firm enough to fill your macarons with.

  NOTE: You can also use the same amount of chocolate chips or any other form of chocolate by weight. The amounts listed here are for how we like to make ganache using this brand of chocolate. Whatever chocolate you use, just make sure that you stir the chocolate enough to dissolve and melt any remaining little chunks. You might need to add a little more milk if your chocolate is still looking grainy.
  

Notes

• Please use or borrow a kitchen scale that can measure grams.
• We made these macarons using aquafaba powder from VÖR. We used the powder at double strength. It whips up in half the time that way. Using the liquid from a can of chickpeas will work just fine as well. We just use aquafaba a lot and can only keep up with eating so many chickpeas.
• We actually like to sift the almond flour and powdered sugar the day before. It can take a while. You can sift double the amount in order to save half of it for the next time you make macarons. It’s really nice to have the almond flour sifted and ready to go to make the whole process feel even quicker the next time around.
• If you don’t have cream of tartar, you can use a teaspoon of vinegar or lemon juice. The acid helps to stabilize the whipped aquafaba.
• If this is your first time making vegan macarons, we recommend not experimenting with flavoring in the cookies themselves. The same applies to using a lot of food coloring. If you are going to flavor the cookies, avoid using oil-based or alcohol-based extracts. These will deflate your meringue. Also try to use gel or powdered food coloring. Water-based food coloring will also alter the texture of your meringue.
• Flavor and color the Italian meringue buttercream after adding in all of the butter.
• It’s best to use a silicone baking mat to make these. Parchment paper can become soggy and wrinkly while the macarons are resting. This can cause them to bake into an uneven shape. That’s why our eclairs and cream puffs get little ridges on the bottom, but we don’t mind those on choux pastries.
• Avoid using very liquid or wet fillings. These will soak into the macaron shells and cause them to become soggy.
• We like eating ours best the same day if they’re filled with chocolate ganache. When filled with buttercream, they stay crunchy and soft. They taste really nice the next day after refrigerating them.
• We will be editing this recipe soon to try to make changes similar to our French meringue macaron recipe. Even though there are some pits, these macarons are still really delicious.

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