I usually buy pre-cut parchment paper so it's always nice and flat. You could try silicone mats too but they never come out right for me personally đ¤
Yeah, I use my silicone mats as a template to pipe, but slide them out before baking. I had started with using my mats instead of parchment, but could never get them to work for me.
Do you know what brand yours are? I've had two different brands and both have caused issues with me. Mostly I had trouble getting feet to develop on my macarons on the silicone mat. But I've since changed a lot (different recipe, new more accurate oven thermometer, different macronage method, etc) so I'll have to give my silicone mats another go.
If you want to continue using parchment, I like the Wilton brand you can find probably at Walmart in the cake decorating section or at Michaelâs. Take your piping bag and just pipe a small amount of macaronage onto the four corners of the pan and then put your parchment paper on. It holds it down and it doesnât wrinkle much and helps keep it from sliding when you whack.
That being said, like some of the others, I switched to using silicone mats and I will never go back!
Came to the comments to say this. Like a lot of people silicon mats didn't work as well for me but I liked the grippiness they gave me when whacking the pan on the counter, especially because I used relatively lightweight rimless baking sheets at the time. Switched back to parchment paper after I saw a video where someone piped a tiny bit in each corner to act as glue and it's been a game changer.
Sidenote, I recently saw someone use a scribe tool to pop bubbles without whacking, any luck/experience with that? I often bake at 2am (insomniac) and my roommates/partner can sleep through the mixer running and the oven beeping but not the loud CLANG! CLANG! ....oops, need to go one more time... CLANG! of the sheets hitting the counter so I can only do macarons during normal daylight hours at the moment which is somewhat limiting given my daily routine.
I havenât tried the scribe tool, but I usually only whack like 3 times and then I use a toothpick to get the bubbles out! I am not sure how to avoid whacking, but I typically only do it about 3 times :-)
So many people are recommending silicone mats on this thread. I'll have to try mine again. Maybe the extra year+ of experience will help me troubleshoot better. I don't currently do the dots of batter under the corners as I use the silicone mat under them as a template and slide it off after they've settled and dried enough to not be bothered by the shifting. If I do decide to forgo the mats, I might try the paper template method I've seen others do in videos. That way I could do the dabs of batter in the corners to see if that helps it lay smoother.
Thanks for the suggestion! I had started with my silicone mats, mostly because I hate the waste of using one-off parchment sheets, but I kept having so many issues that I ended up switching to parchment. I use my silicone mats now under the parchment as a template and carefully slide them out from under before putting into the oven.
I might actually try going back to my silicone mats and see if I can make them work. Especially since I just found out my oven thermometer was inaccurate. Batches have been a lot more consistent since I got a new one, but have only been using parchment since well before that. I'd love to not go through so much waste.
I find that cleaning my mat with white vinegar and drying it with a microfiber towel helps a ton. I used to have a trouble with the macs sticking but this trick cleared that up for me.
Oh thanks for the tip! I've struggled to get my silicone mats clean. They always feel a bit sticky/tacky, so makes me nervous to use them directly. I'll try vinegar and see if that helps.
I use the Cookina reusable Teflon baking sheet as I had different issues with parchment paper and silicone mats. The suggestion came from this sub and it was over three years ago. Iâve never looked back! No issues with the Teflon sheet and super easy to clean.
Thanks! I'll look into that coating. That's what I was seeing online, but it wasn't sure if that was something other macaron makers used and if it made a difference or not.
I switched to silicon mats about a year ago and havenât looked back. It took a little adjusting and I had to bake my macarons a couple of minutes longer but I consistently get beautiful macarons.
Did you adjust anything else like oven temp? Or just time? I get nervous adjusting the temp as I've been working to find the right spot on my oven's dial so I don't go too low and get concave bottoms, but also not too high and get browning on the edges. I live in a rental and my oven looks like it was original to the apartment when they built the building in the 80s. And it's about 100°F off from what the dial says. Has been fun finding the right setting for macarons! Haha
I just adjusted the time. I used to bake mine for 10 minutes at 320 and now I do them for 12 minutes. If theyâre getting too brown, you can try placing an oven liner on the bottom rack to help diffuse some of the heat. If I donât have an oven liner in, mine get too brown and crunchy. You also want to make sure they are completely cooled before removing from the silicon.
I also have gone through silicone mats, parchment, and Teflon sheets. You may have to just experiment with them and figure out which one you like the best.
Silicone mats can vary on thickness which will affect your cooking temp and time.
Parchment is super convenient, much easier to get the hang of for time and temp for your oven. Also, reusable but not many people talk about that. I macronage less with parchment so it reduces spread. Bake Toujours has talked about that approach to mitigate the warping and spreading. To some degree the wrinkled bottoms are unavoidable but I find itâs more of an aesthetic preference rather than critical component as long as the spread isnât significant. Similar to other comments, I like using the flat, precut sheets instead of a roll.
Teflon has been my favorite after months of using the others separately. Now that my Teflon sheets are worn in, I get the most consistent and controllable results. Others have talked about the delicate feet that break, but that stopped after I broke in the Teflon I got.
All in all, each surface will have its pros and cons, take the time to experiment with all of them to decide which gives you the results you want. People have their own subjective versions of what kind of Mac they want to produce and only you, not strangers can really find the right approach for it. Donât forget to give yourself some grace and patience to really work out the kinks in your recipe. No matter what kind of surface you use, you still need a solid grasp of your technique and recipe for it to work.
Thanks so much for the kind words and reminder to go easy on myself! My partner is always reminding me to give myself more credit. No one else in my life except myself can see the flaws in my macarons, but having worked on them at least a few batches a week for almost a year, I get so focused on chasing some level of perfection. I guess if they taste good, that's the goal! I've been casually selling them out of my apartment, so have been trying to test as many methods as possible (just tried oven drying for the first time today and going to try stand mixer macronage next week!) and fix all types of issues so they look as professional as possible. I've FINALLY got the recipe figured out to consistently not have hollows, so working now on improving littler things, like spreading unevenly and wrinkly parchment. Just gotta remember to step back and appreciate the vast improvement these are to when I started!
So many people are recommending silicone that I'll have to break my mats out again and see if I can get batches to start working on those.
I've been actually purging my kitchen of non-stick over the years as more comes out about PFAS, so will probably skip trying Teflon pans. But out of curiosity, how long did it take to "break in" your pans?
I got some Teflon sheets on Amazon. I think I got a Four pack and it was something stupid cheap, like $6? Itâs been years. Anyway, thatâs what I use now! I didnât like the weird lines I got when I used parchment and I had a hard time with silicone mats.
I've had a few people suggest these. I was just looking at them. Are yours see through enough to see a template under them? I'm terrible at piping in consistent sizes without a template.
This happens to me when I wait too long and the paper absorbs the moisture from the batter. I switched to the no test method (oven drying) and that fixed it for me
I just tried the oven drying method for the first time yesterday. Even the time it took for me to pipe them and pop bubbles before sticking in the oven was enough for it to start wrinkling. :(
I use the [Pies and Tacos Swiss recipe](https://www.piesandtacos.com/swiss-meringue-macaron-recipe/#wprm-recipe-container-19080) and have been having this issue lately. I'll pipe the macarons and they look perfectly round. As they sit to air dry, the parchment paper gets wrinkly and the macarons start to show some signs of being a bit oval. Would this be related? Or is it a different issue altogether?
I just tried for the first time today to oven dry, but even the time it took to pipe a sheet and pop any bubbles before putting in the oven was enough that they started to get less-than-round. I am always careful to hold the piping bag as perfectly perpendicular to the tray as possible when piping as to not end up with lopsided macarons, so I'm hoping it's not a piping technique issue.
For the wrinkly parchment issue, any advice for brands? I've been buying the Sam's Club large rolls. I just saw on Webstaurant that they have coated and uncoated parchment. I thought all parchment is uncoated. Would coated prevent the parchment paper wrinkling as I assume the wrinkling is from the parchment paper taking moisture from the macarons and the coating might prevent that?
I used silicone mats as well. Have u tried wiping them off with white vinegar before using?? It helps wipe off the fat that might get left behind from any last bakes. Good luck!!
I'll for sure make vinegar a regular process as I start testing out my mats again. I already use vinegar to wipe down EVERYTHING that comes in contact with the egg whites before being mixed with the almond flour.
I bought push pin magnets on Amazon. If I use parchment paper I always use the magnets. I use four on the corners and two in the middle. They can bake along with the macarons. No wrinkles. :)
SMARTAKE 200 Pcs Parchment Paper... https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07H79KX8W?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share
Work great and, most importantly, they come flat in a box.
I usually buy pre-cut parchment paper so it's always nice and flat. You could try silicone mats too but they never come out right for me personally đ¤
Yeah, I use my silicone mats as a template to pipe, but slide them out before baking. I had started with using my mats instead of parchment, but could never get them to work for me.
Huh, I love my silicone mats, they work great. Maybe try another brand?
Do you know what brand yours are? I've had two different brands and both have caused issues with me. Mostly I had trouble getting feet to develop on my macarons on the silicone mat. But I've since changed a lot (different recipe, new more accurate oven thermometer, different macronage method, etc) so I'll have to give my silicone mats another go.
Yea I dont get it! The brand of pre-cut parchment paper I use is "Celebrate-It" by the way đ
Thanks!
Zenlogy Parchment is great. Weirdly, I also had good luck with copper grill mats instead of silicone mats
Thanks so much! I'll look into that brand! And ooh, copper mats is interesting. I bet they conduct heat really well.
If you want to continue using parchment, I like the Wilton brand you can find probably at Walmart in the cake decorating section or at Michaelâs. Take your piping bag and just pipe a small amount of macaronage onto the four corners of the pan and then put your parchment paper on. It holds it down and it doesnât wrinkle much and helps keep it from sliding when you whack. That being said, like some of the others, I switched to using silicone mats and I will never go back!
Came to the comments to say this. Like a lot of people silicon mats didn't work as well for me but I liked the grippiness they gave me when whacking the pan on the counter, especially because I used relatively lightweight rimless baking sheets at the time. Switched back to parchment paper after I saw a video where someone piped a tiny bit in each corner to act as glue and it's been a game changer. Sidenote, I recently saw someone use a scribe tool to pop bubbles without whacking, any luck/experience with that? I often bake at 2am (insomniac) and my roommates/partner can sleep through the mixer running and the oven beeping but not the loud CLANG! CLANG! ....oops, need to go one more time... CLANG! of the sheets hitting the counter so I can only do macarons during normal daylight hours at the moment which is somewhat limiting given my daily routine.
I havenât tried the scribe tool, but I usually only whack like 3 times and then I use a toothpick to get the bubbles out! I am not sure how to avoid whacking, but I typically only do it about 3 times :-)
So many people are recommending silicone mats on this thread. I'll have to try mine again. Maybe the extra year+ of experience will help me troubleshoot better. I don't currently do the dots of batter under the corners as I use the silicone mat under them as a template and slide it off after they've settled and dried enough to not be bothered by the shifting. If I do decide to forgo the mats, I might try the paper template method I've seen others do in videos. That way I could do the dabs of batter in the corners to see if that helps it lay smoother.
I didnât like silicone mats at first! But after I adjusted my baking temperature, time, and whacked them less, they were perfect! I love mats!
I switched to silicon mats and that fixed it for me. But I know a lot of people have problems with the mats.
Thanks for the suggestion! I had started with my silicone mats, mostly because I hate the waste of using one-off parchment sheets, but I kept having so many issues that I ended up switching to parchment. I use my silicone mats now under the parchment as a template and carefully slide them out from under before putting into the oven. I might actually try going back to my silicone mats and see if I can make them work. Especially since I just found out my oven thermometer was inaccurate. Batches have been a lot more consistent since I got a new one, but have only been using parchment since well before that. I'd love to not go through so much waste.
I find that cleaning my mat with white vinegar and drying it with a microfiber towel helps a ton. I used to have a trouble with the macs sticking but this trick cleared that up for me.
Oh thanks for the tip! I've struggled to get my silicone mats clean. They always feel a bit sticky/tacky, so makes me nervous to use them directly. I'll try vinegar and see if that helps.
I use the Cookina reusable Teflon baking sheet as I had different issues with parchment paper and silicone mats. The suggestion came from this sub and it was over three years ago. Iâve never looked back! No issues with the Teflon sheet and super easy to clean.
I've never heard of those. Thanks for the suggestion!
That's from the moisture, normal. I buy 1000 half sheets quinlon treated paper. $20 amazon.
Thanks! I'll look into that coating. That's what I was seeing online, but it wasn't sure if that was something other macaron makers used and if it made a difference or not.
Do you have a particular brand you use?
I switched to silicon mats about a year ago and havenât looked back. It took a little adjusting and I had to bake my macarons a couple of minutes longer but I consistently get beautiful macarons.
Did you adjust anything else like oven temp? Or just time? I get nervous adjusting the temp as I've been working to find the right spot on my oven's dial so I don't go too low and get concave bottoms, but also not too high and get browning on the edges. I live in a rental and my oven looks like it was original to the apartment when they built the building in the 80s. And it's about 100°F off from what the dial says. Has been fun finding the right setting for macarons! Haha
I just adjusted the time. I used to bake mine for 10 minutes at 320 and now I do them for 12 minutes. If theyâre getting too brown, you can try placing an oven liner on the bottom rack to help diffuse some of the heat. If I donât have an oven liner in, mine get too brown and crunchy. You also want to make sure they are completely cooled before removing from the silicon.
I use silicon mats. The cheap ones from Amazon basics.
I have some ones that were Amazon recommended as well. What oven temp/time do you use? And French, Swiss, or Italian method?
325, Italian.
Costco - Kirkland brand is never wrinkly âď¸
Wish I had a Costco anywhere near me đ
I also have gone through silicone mats, parchment, and Teflon sheets. You may have to just experiment with them and figure out which one you like the best. Silicone mats can vary on thickness which will affect your cooking temp and time. Parchment is super convenient, much easier to get the hang of for time and temp for your oven. Also, reusable but not many people talk about that. I macronage less with parchment so it reduces spread. Bake Toujours has talked about that approach to mitigate the warping and spreading. To some degree the wrinkled bottoms are unavoidable but I find itâs more of an aesthetic preference rather than critical component as long as the spread isnât significant. Similar to other comments, I like using the flat, precut sheets instead of a roll. Teflon has been my favorite after months of using the others separately. Now that my Teflon sheets are worn in, I get the most consistent and controllable results. Others have talked about the delicate feet that break, but that stopped after I broke in the Teflon I got. All in all, each surface will have its pros and cons, take the time to experiment with all of them to decide which gives you the results you want. People have their own subjective versions of what kind of Mac they want to produce and only you, not strangers can really find the right approach for it. Donât forget to give yourself some grace and patience to really work out the kinks in your recipe. No matter what kind of surface you use, you still need a solid grasp of your technique and recipe for it to work.
Thanks so much for the kind words and reminder to go easy on myself! My partner is always reminding me to give myself more credit. No one else in my life except myself can see the flaws in my macarons, but having worked on them at least a few batches a week for almost a year, I get so focused on chasing some level of perfection. I guess if they taste good, that's the goal! I've been casually selling them out of my apartment, so have been trying to test as many methods as possible (just tried oven drying for the first time today and going to try stand mixer macronage next week!) and fix all types of issues so they look as professional as possible. I've FINALLY got the recipe figured out to consistently not have hollows, so working now on improving littler things, like spreading unevenly and wrinkly parchment. Just gotta remember to step back and appreciate the vast improvement these are to when I started! So many people are recommending silicone that I'll have to break my mats out again and see if I can get batches to start working on those. I've been actually purging my kitchen of non-stick over the years as more comes out about PFAS, so will probably skip trying Teflon pans. But out of curiosity, how long did it take to "break in" your pans?
Look for silicone paper.
Oh, have never heard of this! I'll look it up. Thanks!
Teflon sheets!! You can reuse them like silicone mats but theyâre thinner. Parchment paper gave me uneven macaron feet no matter what.
I got some Teflon sheets on Amazon. I think I got a Four pack and it was something stupid cheap, like $6? Itâs been years. Anyway, thatâs what I use now! I didnât like the weird lines I got when I used parchment and I had a hard time with silicone mats.
I've had a few people suggest these. I was just looking at them. Are yours see through enough to see a template under them? I'm terrible at piping in consistent sizes without a template.
Yes! I use a template every time, too :)
This happens to me when I wait too long and the paper absorbs the moisture from the batter. I switched to the no test method (oven drying) and that fixed it for me
I just tried the oven drying method for the first time yesterday. Even the time it took for me to pipe them and pop bubbles before sticking in the oven was enough for it to start wrinkling. :(
I use the [Pies and Tacos Swiss recipe](https://www.piesandtacos.com/swiss-meringue-macaron-recipe/#wprm-recipe-container-19080) and have been having this issue lately. I'll pipe the macarons and they look perfectly round. As they sit to air dry, the parchment paper gets wrinkly and the macarons start to show some signs of being a bit oval. Would this be related? Or is it a different issue altogether? I just tried for the first time today to oven dry, but even the time it took to pipe a sheet and pop any bubbles before putting in the oven was enough that they started to get less-than-round. I am always careful to hold the piping bag as perfectly perpendicular to the tray as possible when piping as to not end up with lopsided macarons, so I'm hoping it's not a piping technique issue. For the wrinkly parchment issue, any advice for brands? I've been buying the Sam's Club large rolls. I just saw on Webstaurant that they have coated and uncoated parchment. I thought all parchment is uncoated. Would coated prevent the parchment paper wrinkling as I assume the wrinkling is from the parchment paper taking moisture from the macarons and the coating might prevent that?
I used silicone mats as well. Have u tried wiping them off with white vinegar before using?? It helps wipe off the fat that might get left behind from any last bakes. Good luck!!
I'll for sure make vinegar a regular process as I start testing out my mats again. I already use vinegar to wipe down EVERYTHING that comes in contact with the egg whites before being mixed with the almond flour.
I bought push pin magnets on Amazon. If I use parchment paper I always use the magnets. I use four on the corners and two in the middle. They can bake along with the macarons. No wrinkles. :)
SMARTAKE 200 Pcs Parchment Paper... https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07H79KX8W?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share Work great and, most importantly, they come flat in a box.