Madeleines (French Butter Cakes)
On my list of recipes that I intend to try are the French miniature cake, madeleines. This past weekend, I slogged through a miserable day and made it to the restaurant supply store in town that was my only chance of actually buying the pan necessary to make this dainty treat. My luck held out ... they had ONE ... ONE left. I wanted to buy 2 but figured for a first trial, it was better than nothing, and it DID cost me $8.25 CDN (plus 13% tax).
Today, after lunch, as I had only had one call for a job, out of town, which I don't do, I decided to try out the simple recipe I had googled on the net.
French Butter Cakes (Madeleines) - makes one dozen full sized or about 18 miniature madeleines
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup white sugar
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup granulated sugar for decoration
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Butter and flour 12 (3 inch) madeleine molds; set aside.
Melt butter and let cool to room temperature.
In a small mixing bowl, beat eggs, vanilla and salt at high speed until light. Beating constantly, gradually add sugar; and continue beating at high speed until mixture is thick and pale and ribbons form in bowl when beaters are lifted, (5 to) 10 minutes.
Sift flour into egg mixture 1/3 at a time, gently folding after each addition.
Add lemon zest and pour melted butter around edge of batter. Quickly but gently fold butter into batter. Spoon batter into molds; it will mound slightly above tops.
Bake 11 to 13 minutes, or until cakes are golden and the tops spring back when gently pressed with your fingertip.
Use the tip of the knife to loosen madeleines from pan; invert onto rack. Immediately sprinkle warm cookies with granulated sugar. Madeleines are best eaten the day they're baked. Leftover madeleines are wonderful when dunked into coffee or tea.
Trial 1: Madeleines were done after 9 min as my oven had been pre-heated for about half an hour which is how long it took me to make these, not my usual 5 minutes. :)
The flavour of these cakes is delicately lemony (I only used half a tbsp of lemon zest) and somewhat buttery. Although they didn't have the "hump" on the top (I suspect I would have had to refrigerate the batter for half an hour before filling the molds for this to happen) they had the characteristic scalloped side from the molds and came out immediately on being removed from the oven. I had some batter left so I made the modified version of madeleines in the bottom of buttered and floured muffin tins. I have lost the reference to the special name given to this variation (gateau de Commercy??) which I read in a blog yesterday.
Verdict: They were ok. I wouldn't travel across town to get to a bakery to buy them though. I WILL make them again. After all, I have the pan now. :) And there are a number of interesting variations I would like to try ie. add ground almonds to the genoise-type batter, flavour variations such as chocolate, chocolate-orange, matcha tea, earl gray tea, dip them in chocolate when done etc.
Today, after lunch, as I had only had one call for a job, out of town, which I don't do, I decided to try out the simple recipe I had googled on the net.
French Butter Cakes (Madeleines) - makes one dozen full sized or about 18 miniature madeleines
2 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup white sugar
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup granulated sugar for decoration
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Butter and flour 12 (3 inch) madeleine molds; set aside.
Melt butter and let cool to room temperature.
In a small mixing bowl, beat eggs, vanilla and salt at high speed until light. Beating constantly, gradually add sugar; and continue beating at high speed until mixture is thick and pale and ribbons form in bowl when beaters are lifted, (5 to) 10 minutes.
Sift flour into egg mixture 1/3 at a time, gently folding after each addition.
Add lemon zest and pour melted butter around edge of batter. Quickly but gently fold butter into batter. Spoon batter into molds; it will mound slightly above tops.
Bake 11 to 13 minutes, or until cakes are golden and the tops spring back when gently pressed with your fingertip.
Use the tip of the knife to loosen madeleines from pan; invert onto rack. Immediately sprinkle warm cookies with granulated sugar. Madeleines are best eaten the day they're baked. Leftover madeleines are wonderful when dunked into coffee or tea.
Trial 1: Madeleines were done after 9 min as my oven had been pre-heated for about half an hour which is how long it took me to make these, not my usual 5 minutes. :)
The flavour of these cakes is delicately lemony (I only used half a tbsp of lemon zest) and somewhat buttery. Although they didn't have the "hump" on the top (I suspect I would have had to refrigerate the batter for half an hour before filling the molds for this to happen) they had the characteristic scalloped side from the molds and came out immediately on being removed from the oven. I had some batter left so I made the modified version of madeleines in the bottom of buttered and floured muffin tins. I have lost the reference to the special name given to this variation (gateau de Commercy??) which I read in a blog yesterday.
Verdict: They were ok. I wouldn't travel across town to get to a bakery to buy them though. I WILL make them again. After all, I have the pan now. :) And there are a number of interesting variations I would like to try ie. add ground almonds to the genoise-type batter, flavour variations such as chocolate, chocolate-orange, matcha tea, earl gray tea, dip them in chocolate when done etc.