Madeleines: Tips & Techniques

[MartyL]

We're testing out some brand new Madeleine pans tomorrow and I was wondering whether anyone had any tried and true recipes worthy of inspiring Proustian memories.

Here's one recipe I found from Williams-Sonoma:

Madeleine Recipe from Williams-Sonoma

We were thinking about doing this one and substituting Rose Water for the "Orange Flower Water" called for in the recipe.

I'd be grateful for any suggestions.

[bushey]

I, too, have madeleine pans that I've been meaning to use (I'm embarrassed to tell you how old they are). Patricia Wells has a recipe in her Food Lovers' Guide to Paris, which you can also find online through a search engine. She refers to them as lemon tea cakes.

Last weekend I pulled out the recipe but it calls for regular, unbleached flour but all I had was King Arthur's and I didn't feel like running out to get some. I know, I know, ambitious enough to bake madeleines but too lazy to go to the store. Story of my life . Looking forward to trying again.

[Louisa Chu]

This is a classic recipe we use at Cordon Bleu Paris. Excellent results. If you're in the States use cake flour, in France it's type 45. Lemon zest is an option.

MADELEINES

20 pieces

Ingredients

4 eggs

170 g sugar

1 pinch salt

10 g honey

5 g baking powder

180 g flour

200 g butter

Preheat oven to 170°C, then reduce heat to160°C and bake.

Melt butter – no colour - cool to just warm.

In medium bowl, whisk eggs. Add sugar and honey then whisk lightly – do not overwork batter. Add flour, salt, baking powder, ½ melted butter then turn with whisk to just mix. Add ½ butter then turn with whisk to just mix. Cover bowl with plastic, chill, rest overnight.

Butter molds with softened butter – to maximum nearly filling depressions. Flour, bang off excess. Place smooth, medium tip in pastry bag, fill bag halfway with batter, barely fill molds evenly.

Bake on baking sheet, about 7 minutes, golden around with pale point/tête.

Unmold immediately by banging onto papered surface, turn immediately to cooling rack with têtes up.

[Steve Klc]

I'd consider pairing pistachio flour or pistachio paste with the rosewater as an experiment, MartyL. Use a light hand with the rosewater. I prefer the "French" rosewater (and orange flower water) in the little blue bottles.

Of course this stretches the classic French nature of this.

[Bond Girl]

Here is a try and tested one from Patricia Well's cook book:

13 Tbs of unsalted butter

1 2/3 cups of confectioners sugar

1/2 cup + 1 Tbs of flour

1/2 cup of finely ground unblanched almond

6 large egg whites

1 Tbs of honey

-Butter a madeleine tin and dust with flour

-Brown butter and set aside to cool

-sift sugar and flour and stir in ground almond

-Beat egg whites until frothy and stir in sugar flour almond mix

-stir in brown butter and honey

-spoon batter into t he molds (I prefer to use a pastry bag for this.)

-refrigerate the batter for about an hour

-bake in 375 oven for 10-15 minutes

Makes 24 Madeleines.

[LaurieA-B]

After enjoying the chocolate madeleines at Lark, I want to try baking some myself. I plan to try the Cook's Illustrated recipe first (plain, and then perhaps the chocolate variation). First I need the pan. King Arthur features the silicone madeleine pan. What do you think? Has anyone had great success with the silicone, or should I go for a traditional metal pan?

I think the reason that I never baked madeleines before is that I didn't want to buy a pan limited to one thing. But they are so delicious, and now that I have a baby I realize that mini-madeleines are a perfect kids' treat.

[nightscotsman]

Hi Laurie! Yes, the silicone pans work fine, and they release very easily, but they tend to give a shiney surface to the finished items that doesn't seem quite traditional. You should be able to find metal pans that are cheaper, and if you brush them liberally with soft butter mixed with flour (or brush with butter and dust with flour) they will pop out fine. Be sure the dump them out of the mold while they are still hot from the oven and cover with a kitchen towel to keep them from drying out.

One tip on madeleines: they don't keep well and aren't nearly as good the second day. But the batter does hold up in the fridge for a few days

[NeroW]

I love madelines! We use a recipe like loufood's but we brown the butter.

[foodie3]

i am planning to make some traditional ones, but can't decide which recipe to use - there sooo many;

what are your favorites?

do you rest/refrigerate batter?

do you use nonstick, tin or silicone pans, does size matter?

[LT Wong]

I normally make a variation of the traditional one, except that I add orange flower water. I cannot remember where I got this recipe, but it was quite foolproof in that it worked the first time (I'm a weekend home baker). And I managed to get the dome too.

I do not rest nor chill the batter, and I use heavy aluminium pans.

My only problem with the recipe was that the madeleine sticks despite brushing with butter. But I picked up a tip from Cook's Illustrated on a recent article on madeleines. They recommend using a melted butter-flour mixture to brush on, and it worked very well for me ever since.

[TheFuzzy]

LT, Foodie:

I prefer my sweetie's family recipe, with lemon zest and sugared lemon juic e applied after baking. And Oh! we have meyer lemons now, I should ask he to make some. Good idea!

For not sticking, we butter, then flour the pans with a sifter. Works great, and easy.

One note, though. Madelaines are 100% better when they're still warm, and they get stale within 12 hours in my experience. So they're best eaten straight out of the pan. I can't stand packaged madelaines ...

[McDuff]

Healy and Bugat--The French Cookie Book

[ludja]

I've had good success with Joel Robuchon's recipes in Simply French by Patricia Wells. (commission for egullet if you order thru this Amazon link; nice cookbook overall; elegant recipes from Robuchon but not too fussy or difficult; great writing by Patricia Wells).

There are recipes for five different flavors--I've made the honey ones and lemon ones and they are excellent (as mentioned above, served slightly warm). There are also recipes for chocolate, pistachio and hazelnut that I am now reinspired to try again soon.

The base recipe for the honey, lemon and chocolate ones contains ground almonds which I find to be really good. (don't think these are in all madeleine recipes I've seen). Another possible distinction in these recipes is that they have honey in addition to confectioner's sugar as a sweetener. Again, I haven't done side by side comparisons, but they sure do taste good...

Regarding technique, etc...

I have the traditional 3" molds; they are not non-stick, and I think they are heavy aluminum. Using a brush to coat them well with softened butter, then dusting with flour has worked well for me to eliminate sticking.

I haven't varied from the recipe's recommendation for chilling the batter in the molds for ~ 1 hour prior to baking. (Have gotton the nice little 'bumps' so I've been happy).

[foodie3]

i am leaning towards p. rigo's recipe from american boulangerie; its a little different from others i've seen in that he doesn't whip the eggs, but rather adds them to melted butter.

LT Wong, how do you prepare the butter/flour combo for brushing the pans, is it thick?

[rickster]

What are the secrets to getting the dome? I've tried umpteen recipes, including some of the ones mentioned, and have rarely been successful in this respect. Still taste pretty good though.

[ludja]

What are the secrets to getting the dome? I've tried umpteen recipes, including some of the ones mentioned, and have rarely been successful in this respect. Still taste pretty good though.

According to Bugat and Healy (The French Cookie Book) the key is not overbeating the eggs and not having too much baking powder. Then, when baking at high temperatures, the outside of the cookie gets a crust on it before the inside sets. Gases that are trapped inside push to form the hump.

(Baking powder releases gas for leavening and beating eggs incorporates air--so I guess if there is to much 'gas' inside the cookie, it will push through and the cookie will deflate. With the right conditions (gas in dough, temperature of baking, etc) things can balance out to get the hump.)

In the Patrica Wells/Joel Robuchon book I mentioned above, she avows that it is the chilling of the dough before baking that is important. Cooler temps will keep gases dissolved better and perhaps the starting with the cool dough also helps with crisping the outside of the madeleine before the inside sets as well....

On a different note--just noticed another big difference b/t the Bugat/Healy and Wells/Robuchon recipes besides those I mentioned above. Bugat/Healy ues whole eggs plus and extra egg yolk and has a small amount of baking powder. Wells/Robuchon uses only whipped egg whites (and no baking powder) for leavening...

I'm pretty sure the Bugat/Healy recipe would be the more classical--but as mentioned above the Wells/Robuchon ones that I've made have been excellent-- and have the humps! I need to compare the two now!

must edit to add: I am not a pro and am going by the books, my chemistry background and a modicum of baking experience!

Edited July 15, 2004 by ludja (log)

[AlainV]

For traditional madeleines, I use Gaston Lenôtre recipe in "Mes desserts préférés, 2001". The trick to get big humps is to refrigerate the dough for 24 hours. I use buttered non-stick pans and had no problems so far.

Joël Robuchon's recipe in "Simply french" works very well too but is not true madeleines. The use of whipped egg whites and ground almonds are a characteristic of the "Vistandines de Lorraine" dough. Very light and good but not true madeleine.

[Wendy DeBord]

I haven't baked madeleines in years. At work, next months specials are French-so I chose madeleines as one of my specials. I knew you guys were talking about them so I thought I'd explore them further with your help. BUT so far no ones' post a recipe and I don't own any of the mentioned books. Any chance some of you would post the actual recipes, please????

I never refridgerated my madeleines before baking previously and sometimes I'd get the huge hump and sometimes not. I never knew you wanted the hump. We used to pair two together putting preserves between them and the humps were in the way so if they had them I'd slice them off.

I'm definately interested in learning more about these little cakes. How about flavors..........so far I've only made lemon, cinnamon and chocolate. What other flavors have you seen?

[Andy Lynes]

This recipe is previously unpublished and given to me by British Michelin starred chef Bruce Poole and is the one he uses in the kitchen of his restaurant Chez Bruce:

6 eggs

225g caster sugar

30g Dark brown sugar

Pinch of salt

227g Plain Flour

1 1/2 tsp baking Powder

270g melted butter

Pre-heat the oven to 200C. Butter the madeleine tins, chill and then butter again. This will help prevent the madeleines from sticking. Hopefully. Otherwise, invest in a non-stick tin. Beat the eggs, add the following 5 ingredients and mix. Stir in the butter. Fill the madeleine molds and bake for 5 minutes for small madeleines or 10 minutes for large.

I achieved a good "bump" with this recipe without chilling the batter, but if Robuchon/Wells say chill it, then chill it.

[Bond Girl]

I use the recipe from Dorie Greenspan's Paris Sweets book and experiementing with infusions like lemon verbena. Spoon the batter into a heavy aluminum brushed with butter and powdered with sugar, let it rest, and bake. The consistency here is more like a cake and less like a cookie.

The Joel Rubichon and Patricia Wells recipe never worked for me for some reason.

[Elissa]

I've been curious to try Wells' Rosemary Parmesean Mads from her Bistro book, which calls for unbleached flour.

[foodie3]

madeleines from by p. rigo's american boulangerie. according to his instructions the batter was chilled overnight and the filled pans frozen for 10 mins prior to baking - i got nice "humps " as a result. the cookies taste pleasant and buttery with a somewhat cakey texture. they certainely could use a little extra flavoring, perhaps lemon or orange. now i want to try other recipes.

[Wendy DeBord]

While at Starbucks today I noticed they are selling a little 3 pack of madeleines (I didn't see the price) but I thought it was interesting. Interesting because having a big chain introduce to tons of people to new products like "madeleines" only helps me sell them too. The more exposure people have to baked goods the better.

Anyway..........I'm curious about pan release with madeleines. I recall having problems in the past and I'd love to avoid problems as I venture into serious madeliene baking. I recall following dirrections about coating the pan with clarified butter and I also recall those sticking in the pan. Perhaps each recipe differs in it's sticking......but I recall having success with using hot pans. I'd heat them in the oven, pull them out, spray them with pan spray and bake and those released very cleanly.

Have any of you really spent some time playing with this issue and resolving it for you? Do you have one method that works with certain pans or certain formulas and other methods for other recipes and pans? Also are you prefering these little cakes plain or do you do anything to dress them up, if so what?.............or is there something you love them paired with?

[nightscotsman]

Wendy, coat the pans generously with a butter flour mixture: 100 g pastry flour to 500 g butter. Just soften a bit in the microwave when you need it and brush on with pastry brush. Works like buttering and flouring, but much faster and much less mess. Also - and I'm sure you already knew this - the madeleines must be removed from the pan as soon as you take them out of the oven.

I think they make a nice garnish to some fruit desserts or ice cream. A nice change from the now ubiquitous tuile.

[LaurieA-B]

Also are you prefering these little cakes plain or do you do anything to dress them up, if so what?.............or is there something you love them paired with?

Lark in Seattle serves chocolate madeleines with a little pot of warm chocolate sauce to dip them in. I didn't actually try the sauce; the madeleines, tipped into a cloth napkin warm from the oven, were enough chocolate for me. So delicious.

Cook's Illustrated March/April 1996 has a brief article on madeleines and, as LT Wong stated above, recommends using a mixture of 2 t melted butter and 1 t flour brushed onto the pan. Their variations are lemon/orange, rosemary, chocolate, and almond. I haven't yet baked madeleines, but I have the pan now and was thinking of trying the Chestnut-Honey Madeleines from The Last Course.