Cocoa-nut Maccaroons (1840)
Reader ratingsCocoa-nut maccaroons from Eliza Leslie’s best-selling American cookbook: little balls of grated coconut, sugar and beaten egg white, dusted with sugar and baked quickly.
- Recipe makes
- About 20 small macaroons
- Prep
- Cook
- Total
The macaroons bake for 12 to 15 minutes and firm up as they cool for about 20 minutes on the parchment. They keep for 3 days in an airtight tin.
Coconut macaroons piled on a white plate.
The story behind the recipe
Coconut, sugar and beaten egg white, rolled into little balls and baked quickly on buttered paper: Eliza Leslie’s Cocoa-nut Maccaroons are about as plain as a sweet gets, and they are small and sturdy enough to pile up. The bill of fare for Lincoln’s 1865 inaugural ball lists a “Cocoanut” among its ornamental pyramids, next to a separate “Macaroon” one, without saying what either was built from.
From the household shelf
Macaroons are our pick for that pyramid, not a record of it: none of the confectioner G. A. Balzer’s own formulas is known. Leslie’s Directions for Cookery (eleventh edition, 1840) was one of the best-selling American cookbooks of the century, and its coconut macaroons are the kind of sweet a household cook of the period could stack.
Leslie’s coconut was fresh. Her recipe calls for “a pound of grated cocoa-nut, or sufficient to make a stiff paste,” and her next recipe begins by breaking up a whole coconut, peeling and grating it. She adds that macaroons “may be made in a similar manner” of cream-nuts, ground-nuts, filberts or English walnuts, so the method mattered more to her than the nut. The whole of Balzer’s sweet column, from nougat to fruit ices, is laid out in What Was on the Sweets Table at Lincoln’s Inaugural Ball?
Read more about this recipe
Making it today
The biggest change is the coconut. Fresh coconut meat is nearly half water, so Leslie’s pound of it carried far less solid coconut than a pound of today’s dried shredded kind. We use dried unsweetened coconut, less of it by weight than her fresh, and add it only until the paste holds together, which is the test she gives. Our oven is also cooler than her “brisk” one, so the macaroons take a little longer than her “few minutes” and color only at the tips.
The two yolks left over are exactly what the custard in the Charlotte Russe (1840) needs.
Beat to a stiff froth the whites of six eggs, and then beat into it very hard a pound of powdered loaf-sugar. Mix with it a pound of grated cocoa-nut, or sufficient to make a stiff paste. Then flour your hands, and make it up into little balls. Lay them on sheets of buttered white paper, and bake them in a brisk oven; first grating loaf-sugar over each. They will be done in a few minutes.
Maccaroons may be made in a similar manner of pounded cream-nuts, ground-nuts, filberts, or English walnuts.
Recipe makes: About 20 small macaroons
Ingredients
For about 20 small macaroons. Quantities are shown as written.
Quantities as written here, for about 20 small macaroons.
- Large egg whites2
- Superfine sugar5.25 oz
- Unsweetened shredded coconut4 oz
- Granulated sugar, for dusting1 tbsp
Measurement notes
Ingredients as written here
- 2 large egg whites
- 5.25 oz superfine sugar
- 4 oz unsweetened shredded coconut
- 1 tbsp granulated sugar, for dusting
Equipment
- Mixing bowl
- Whisk or electric mixer
- Baking sheet
- Parchment paper
- Wire rack
Instructions
Heat the oven to 350°F (175°C), with a shelf in the middle. Line the baking sheet with parchment.
Whisk the egg whites in a clean bowl until they hold stiff peaks.
Add the superfine sugar a spoonful at a time, whisking hard after each addition, until the meringue is thick and glossy.
Fold in about three quarters of the coconut, then add the rest a little at a time, only until the mixture is a stiff paste that holds its shape when squeezed. You may not need the last spoonfuls.
With lightly wet hands, roll heaped tablespoons of the paste into balls about 1½ inches across and set them on the parchment about 1 inch apart.
Sprinkle a little granulated sugar over each ball.
Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, until the tips and edges are pale golden and the outsides feel dry and set.
Leave them on the parchment until firm, about 20 minutes, then lift them off and cool completely on the rack.
Nutrition
70calories per serving
- Recipe makes
- About 20 small macaroons
- Servings
- 20
Estimated per macaroon (20 to the batch) from USDA FoodData Central values for the listed ingredients.
Recipe notes
When adjusting quantities
This is a third of Leslie’s batch of six egg whites. Bake in batches if you make more; don’t crowd the sheet.
Notes
Quantities mentioned in these notes don’t change when you adjust the servings.
Leslie floured her hands to shape the balls; wet hands do the same job without adding flour. Contains egg and coconut.
Scaling changes the ingredients only; pan sizes and cooking times need their own judgment. To adapt this recipe further, try the recipe tool at TuneMyRecipe (opens in a new tab), our sister site.
Sources and attribution
After Eliza Leslie, Directions for Cookery, in Its Various Branches, 11th ed. (Philadelphia: Carey & Hart, 1840), Cocoa-nut Maccaroons
Recipe details
- Course
- Dessert
- Dish family
- Desserts & Sweets
- Region
- American
- Era
- 19th century
- Source decade
- 1840s
- Main ingredient
- Eggs
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Occasion
- Dinner party