Macarons with Vanilla Bean Swiss Meringue Buttercream (Sanity Sunday)

I have a confession to make.  I don't like buttercream frosting.  I know, blasphemous, right?  After all, for awhile I was pretty into cake decorating and while I'm now to the point where I'll eat it, especially if in the position where it would be awkward to reject it, I don't actually like it. 

But today that changed.  I've seen recipes for Swiss meringue buttercream all over the food blog world, but it just didn't sound good.  It's basically whipped egg whites, sugar, and butter, which doesn't really sound appetizing.  Add that to my old fear of overbeating egg whites (which I've conquered ever since I started making macarons), and I was going to pass on it. But I finally tried it today as a filling for some macarons, and not only was it really easy, but it was so much better than regular buttercream.  I thought it would be really heavy (because of the amount of butter) and eggy, but it was actually very light and not too sweet.  I added vanilla bean paste, so it tasted great and had those little vanilla bean flecks, so it was fancy too!  I can't wait to try this frosting on a cake!

Tomorrow I'll share with you what I did with those extra egg yolks!