Despite the name, a Lees Macaroon Bar has nothing to do with the delicate French meringue biscuit — it's a dense fondant bar traditionally bound with potato and rolled in toasted coconut, a recipe that's uniquely Scottish.
Lees of Scotland
The bar comes from Lees of Scotland, founded in 1931 by John H. Lees in Coatbridge, near Glasgow. The company built its reputation on two products that remain its best-known lines to this day: the Macaroon Bar and the Lees Snowball, a marshmallow-and-jam dome coated in chocolate and coconut. Both relied on the same core trick of pairing a soft, sweet filling with toasted desiccated coconut for texture and contrast.
Potato, fondant, and coconut
- The centre — a sweet fondant paste, historically made by mixing mashed potato with icing sugar to bind and bulk out the filling, a technique dating back to Victorian confectionery.
- The coating — dipped in chocolate, then rolled in toasted desiccated coconut for crunch.
- The name confusion — "macaroon" here follows the older English use of the word for coconut-and-sugar confections, entirely separate from the French almond meringue "macaron" that became fashionable decades later.
A distinctly Scottish sweet
The Macaroon Bar remains a point of regional pride in Scotland and is still manufactured by Lees today, sitting alongside other traditional chocolate bars and retro sweets that have stayed largely unchanged since the interwar years.
Frequently asked questions
Who makes the Lees Macaroon Bar?
The Lees Macaroon Bar is made by Lees of Scotland, a confectionery company founded in 1931 by John H. Lees in Coatbridge, near Glasgow.
What is a Macaroon Bar made of?
A Lees Macaroon Bar is a sweet fondant centre, traditionally made using potato as a binding agent, coated in chocolate and rolled in toasted desiccated coconut.
Is a macaroon bar the same as a French macaron?
No. Despite the similar name, a Scottish macaroon bar is a chocolate-coconut fondant confection, while a French macaron is a meringue-based sandwich biscuit made from ground almonds, egg whites and sugar; the two share no recipe or method in common.