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Sunday, June 20, 2010

SMS - Chestnut Honey Madeleines

This week's SMS recipe was chosen by Debbie of Cafe Chibita. I have to admit, I almost passed on this recipe because I don't have a Madeleine pan. Then I read about using mini muffin pans and thought I'd give it a try. While going through my cake pan assortment, I came across some cute molds that I thought would work too, so I used them as well (if anybody has any idea what these molds are called, please feel free to fill me in). I've never made Madeleines before but I sure have eaten them a lot as a kid. My mom would buy a big bag of them. The nice thing about the kind she bought was that they were individually wrapped.

I've made a few changes to the recipes, which you'll find in the "Final thoughts/tips" section below. These little tea cakes were very easy to make. I actually made the batter last night and baked them this morning without any problems. After they were baked, I waited a little bit and tried one still slightly warm. It was melt-in-your-mouth delicious. Hubby liked it a lot too, as did my friend Wafae and her young daughter.






Final thoughts/tips:
  • Hubby and I enjoyed this tea cakes very much. I liked them so much that I wished I had made half a recipe because I'm eating them waaaaaay too fast. I loved the soft and spongy texture, as well as the flavor and aroma from the toasted almonds, and not to forget, the toasty buttery flavor from using beurre noisette. Hubby gave them a good 9 out of 10 :o)
  • Instead of hazelnuts, I used unblanched almonds which I toasted first, cooled, and then ground in my food processor.
  • Since I didn't have chestnut honey in my pantry, I used orange blossom honey that we bought on a recent trip to Arizona late last year. Yum!
  • I added the following ingredients to the batter: 2 pinches of salt, vanilla extract, and zest of 1/2 a lemon.
  • A big thank to Debbie for choosing another SMS winner. If you'd like to give these a try, check out the recipe HERE.
  • Don't forget to check out what the other SMS bakers thought of these little delicious morsels.

18 comments:

  1. What beautiful madeleines! Love the mini pans.

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  2. Your madeleine's are adorable! Love the little flower molds. They almost remind of shaped tartlet mold. Super cute! Great idea on the additions/swaps. I also used almonds instead of hazelnuts. The lemon zest sounds fanstastic. :)

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  3. I like your changes and additions. The molds are precious and make these look super-special.

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  4. so cute! I love your mini pan!

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  5. Those molds are so cute! Your additions of vanilla and zest sound like good ones. We really liked these too. In fact, when I came home from the store today, I noticed the container they were in was empty, which means a half-batch was consumed in two days.

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  6. Love, love your little floral molds! I almost through in a pinch of salt and thought about vanilla too. Great additions!

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  7. I don't know what they're called but those molds are really cute Hanaa! I'm glad the recipe was such a big hit at your house. Your additions were smart - wish I'd thought to do the same with mine.

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  8. Oh those little blossom pans are darling!! And your addition of the orange honey sounds delish!! I'm glad you and the hubs liked them!

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  9. Adorable madeleines! I LOVE madeleines with tea. Would never be able to resist these in the cookie jar!

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  10. Glad you were able to use these molds! THey're just darling! How springy/summery!

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  11. Thank you all very much for stopping by and leaving such nice comments. I loved reading each one of them :o)

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  12. Such lovely molds. They look beautiful. You don't even need to put powdered sugar on them they're that pretty!
    glad to see you back at "work"... I missed you.
    Anat

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  13. I really love the sunflower-like molds!! Thank you for baking along this week. :D

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  14. Beautiful molds! So glad you liked them; these are one of my favorite snacks.

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  15. Brilliant! I love your changes; the orange blossom honey sounds delicious! I know what you mean about easy to munch on. I had the same issue! Lucky for me, I could send them with larry for his lunch =).

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  16. After eclairs, madeleines are on my list of challenging baking! look delicious!

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  17. So adorable! I am now obsessed by your molds (which may be butter molds or just mini tartlets) so much that I'd rather bake madeleines in them than my annoying madeleine pan.

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  18. I love madeleines! these look just delicious and adorable in the little flower mold. You are so creative.

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