AWESOME ALERT: Macaron Day is TODAY!!!

One of my favorite days of the year is the day when the most elegant of cookies, the macaron, are given away en masse throughout the city. And guess what? (your day is about to get amazing..................)....................FREE MACARON DAY IS TODAY!

There are 15 participating locations in NYC (Gothamist has a helpful Google map if you want to try and get to all of them), and since I work in Midtown East I'll most likely hit up the Bernardaud store for MadMac macarons, FP Patisserie, and Macaron Cafe. All proceeds from further macaron sale will go to City Harvest.

Yummmmmmmmmmmmy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

An Elegant Afternoon of Eating Cookies

I told you all about last week's Macaron Day and you're ever so thankful about that notice right? Either that or you're slapping yourself now for not participating and missing out on all the goodness. Well here's a recap of my experience.

I'm fortunate to work in a neighborhood surrounded by participating macaron bakeries so at lunch I went with a couple coworkers on a mini-macaron scavenger hunt. After lunch in the Plaza Food Hall (yay Luke's Lobster!), our first stop was FP Patisserie. There I chose the chocolate and nibs macaron, which I found delightful. The chocolate flavor wasn't too overpowering, and the macaron's texture was perfect (read: the cookies themselves were hollow like they're supposed to be).

Chocolate and nibs macaron from FP Patisserie

Gift boxes

Macaron display

Our next stop was Macaron Cafe on 59th Street and they win the award for the most amount of flavors and colors (some are even sparkly!). I decided on classic pistachio, though I was tempted by the lavender vanilla and nutella cookies. These macarons were a bit denser but full-flavored and a good all-around cookie.

Macarons at Macaron Cafe

Pistachio Macaron

Lastly we stopped in the china store Bernardaud for MadMac macarons. Their display was very elegant and they were sampling 4 flavors. I chose raspberry and my coworkers and I decided that MadMac wins the award for best macaron of the day. We even met the chef Florian Bellanger, from Cupcake Wars!

MadMac Macarons

My raspberry macaron

This is always a great event and I particularly loved the charitable aspect. A percentage of every purchase at participating bakeries went to one of NYC's greatest charities -- CityHarvest. I hope they were able to feed a lot of people based on New Yorkers' love for macarons!

Holy Macaron-y!

We all love macarons but we all gawk at the ridiculous price tags and find it hard to justify purchasing more than one, am I right? Having attempted to make the confections more than once, I can understand first hand why macarons are so expensive--if you've ever tried, you know what I mean! However, it's because of this fact that tomorrow March 20, 2013 will be one of your most favorite days this Spring.

Sponsored by François Payard Bakery and benefiting Cityharvest, Macaron Day will feature many bakeries throughout NYC, EACH giving away free macarons all day tomorrow. Quantities are limited though, so I'd recommend you make this your lunch tomorrow. That's what I'm going to do :)

Here is the list of participating bakeries in Manhattan (go here for the full list):

Bisous, Ciao. Macarons, 101 Stanton Street (212) 260-3463, and 235 Bleecker Street (212)-675-6366

Bosie Tea Parlor, 10 Morton Street (212) 352-9900

Bakery at Time Warner Center, Ten Columbus Circle, Third Floor, (212) 823-9366

Bouchon Bakery at Rockefeller Center, One Rockefeller Plaza, (212) 782-3890

Butterfield Market, 1114 Lexington Avenue (212) 288-7800

Épicerie Boulud, 1900 Broadway, (212) 595-0303

Francois Payard Bakery, 1775 Broadway/3 Columbus Circle, (212) 956-1775

FP Patisserie, 1 W 59th St, (212) 759-1600

Macaron Café, 161 West 36th Street (212) 566-8300, 44 E. 59th Street (212)995-0888, and 750 Third Avenue (212)995-0888

Macaron Parlour, 111 St. Marks Place (347) 979-6023

Mad-Mac “The Authentic French Macarons” at Bernardaud, 499 Park Avenue at 59th Street, (973) 225-0930

Mille Feuille Bakery and Café, 552 Laguardia Pl (646) 626-6472

Todd English Food Hall at The Plaza Hotel, 1 W 59th St, (212) 986-9260