Macaron vs Marcaroon

Inspired by the recent news of the long queues at the recently opened Laduree Boutique in Takashimaya, I started a conversation between me and my colleague on how people are so willing to pay as much as $5 - $8 for a small macaron.

This led to an innoncent question by my colleague, "Isn't macaroon supposed to be pronounced "mare-kuh-roon"?  To her, macaron and macaroon refer to the same confectionery.

Well, before today, I had no idea if they are the same thing.

But my curiosity to know what was the correct way to pronounce the word led me to do a Google search to find out the answer.

And I found that Macaron and Macaroon are actually two very different confectioneries!

To give a quick explaination of the difference, the two pictures will do the job.

The first pic depicts a Macaron while the second is a Macaroon.

The website here has a good detailed writeup of the difference between the two, but here's my own quick version:

Macaron -  A brightly colored cookie that usually contains a filling that is sandwiched between a top and bottom base made of eggs, icing sugar, granulated sugar and almond powder.

Macaroon - A more chewy type of cookie made with egg-white, sugar, and coconut, often topped with a cherry.

And of course, the way they are pronounced are definitely very different.  You can hear an audio version of macaron here and that of macaroon here.