Makes 20 madeleines
4 large eggs
1 ¼ cup sugar
almond extract—several shakes depending upon its strength and your own taste
a pinch of salt
1 ¼ cups Italian organic 00 soft wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
7/8 cup melted, cooled, butter, preferably unsalted
Whisk the eggs and sugar together, beating well, until the mixture is puffy and fluffy. Add the almond extract, a pinch of salt, the flour and the baking powder and mix until the ingredients are all well combined.
Next, add the melted butter and continue to mix for a few more minutes.
Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator for half an hour.
Carefully spoon the mixture into madeleine molds, taking care not to overfill as they will rise slightly (mostly in the middle). Bake at 350°F for 8-10 minutes. Then lower the oven temperature to 325°F and cook for another 5-6 minutes.
Remove the madeleines from the oven, leave them to cool and then serve with a cup of tea, à la Marcel Proust.
Proust evocatively described his famous madeleine moment as follows: “And soon, without thinking, … I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake. No sooner had the warm liquid, and the crumbs with it, touched my palate, then a shudder ran through my whole body, and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place.”
Madeleines are small, seashell-shaped French cakes, with an intense almond aroma and the double texture of tender delicate sponge in its center with its edges slightly crisp. The characteristic shape comes from the Madeleine molds in which the little cakes are baked. The shell shape has religious origins, having always been the symbol of pilgrims.
Though Proust made them so famous, the cakes were first made in Commercy, in the north-east of France. According to some scholars, their origins are linked to Christianity, the cakes made in honor of Mary Magdalene, the first evangelist of France. This is also the origin of their name: “madeleine“.