Brown Butter Almond Madeleines
Are Almond Madeleines a cookie or a cake? I don’t care! I only know that they’re so easy to make and even easier to eat.
Classic French Madeleines are pretty straightforward. Really, they are more of a tiny sponge cake than a cookie. The classic cookie is flavored with browned butter and a little lemon zest. The result is a delicate and delectable little treat.
For this twist on the classic cookie, I wanted to highlight the subtle nuttiness of the browned butter. I replaced half the flour with almond flour and added a little almond extract to round out the flavor.
In my opinion, yes, you do need to use a real madeleine pan to make the iconic shell shape.
Click here to see how to see step by step photos of how to make Almond Madeleines:
If you love this recipe, try one of these other classic cookie recipes: Sable Cookies, Crisp Lemon Thin Cookies, Almond & Anise Biscotti, Lemon Filled Shortbread.
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Brown Butter Almond Madeleines
Ingredients
- 6 oz unsalted butter
- 2 ½ oz all purpose flour (½ cup, see note)
- 2 oz almond flour (½ cup)
- ⅛ teaspoon table salt
- 3 large eggs
- 1 large yolk
- 5 oz granulated sugar (½ cup plus 2 tablespoons)
- ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon almond extract
Instructions
- Melt 6 oz unsalted butter in a small saucepan. Continue heating the butter until it foams, bubbles and the milk solids fall to the bottom of the pan. Allow the milk solids to brown. Pour the browned butter into a small dish, leaving the browned milk solids in the pan.
- Reserve a tablespoon of the browned butter to grease the Madeleine pan. Set aside the remaining butter to cool but not solidify.
- Whisk together 2 ½ oz all purpose flour, 2 oz almond flour, ⅛ teaspoon table salt and set aside.
- Whisk 3 large eggs, 1 large yolk, 5 oz granulated sugar, ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract and ½ teaspoon almond extract until the eggs are pale, aerated and leave a "ribbon" when the whisk is drawn through the mix. Fold in the flour with a balloon whisk. Fold in the browned butter. Set the batter aside to rest for 1 hour
- While the batter is resting, preheat oven to 400 °F. and brush a madeleine pan with reserved butter then coat with flour.
- Place a heaping tablespoon of batter into each cookie mold.
- Bake 8-10 minutes until golden brown and the center springs back when pressed. Best eaten slightly warm or within a couple of hours of baking.
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Delicious from the first time I made them, wonderful recipie
This is the traditional French recipe, not the American “adapted” butter Madeleines. When I ate Madeleines from the French bakery in Manhattan during my youth, they were always had the almond flavor, and the recipes back then always had crushed almonds or almond extract.
Can I dust the pan with almond flour instead of AP flour?
I suppose so. If the almond flour is at all chunky it could mar the shape of the madeleines. Can I ask why? Do you want to do it for looks or to avoid wheat flour? There is wheat flour in the recipe already so I’m assuming it’s not to be gluten free or anything like that.
Great recipe! This was my third attempt at finding a recipe I liked for making madeleines, and my search is over. The flavor and texture are perfect. Using a whisk to gently fold in the flour and butter produced a much smoother and more consistent result than using a spatula (I simply removed and used the whisk beater from my Kitchenaid stand mixer after I was finished whipping the eggs and sugar). Also, letting it rest on the counter vs in the refrigerator kept the butter from separating and going solid like happened in the second recipe I tried. Thank you!
HO. LEE. CR*P. Just made these. These were sooo goooood! I free-poured from the almond extract bottle and added probably 1tsp instead of 1/2. It was too much, stick to the recipe. Best madeleine recipe ever!
Hi! When you say to remove the milk solids, do you mean the crystallized parts of the brown butter? I’ve never seen to remove those, so just curious what removing them adds.
Thank you!
The butterfat is already flavored by the browning. I prefer to remove the bits because I don’t want that texture in the cookie.
Question: On #3 instructions indicates to whisk together flour, almonds? salt & set aside. But you do NOT list “almonds” or amount of, other than almond flour. Do you mean the almond flour? If not, please clear this up so I can make these. It says “almonds” NOT almond flour. NO idea why no one else has not mentioned anything unless I’m the ONLY one that noticed. I’m presuming you meant almond flour, but need to make sure. Thank you.
Yes, I mean the almond flour, or ground almonds.
This is a great recipe! I also have a dark pan and my first batch came out quite dark on the bottom. For the second batch, I turned my oven down to 375 and baked for about 8mins and that worked great!
I have read in other recipes that you can refrigerate the batter overnight, am I able to do this with your recipe.
Thanks Carol.
These are super tasty. Mine came out pretty dark on the bottom though. I do have a dark pan, so maybe that’s it. Next time I’ll lower the temperature.
Yes, a dark pan will make a difference, mine is light colored aluminum. You can also try moving the oven rack up a bit.
Hello! Since I am gluten sensitive, can I substitute the AP flour with any other flour or will it change the consistency of this recipe? Also, am planning to purchase a madeleine pan, which kind would you suggest I get? Thank you.
I haven’t tried it, but you could probably use gluten free flour. You do want a little structure from the flour and gluten free flours have gums and other ingredients that contribute to the structure. As far as the pan, I use an aluminum pan with a light color. A dark color pan may make the madeleines brown up too fast.
@Patricia David, I realize that you asked this question 2 years ago and you have a pan by now. For others who are searching for the perfect madeleine pan, I highly recommend the USA Pan madeleine pan. It’s actually made in the US, makes 16 (half of the recipe) and is nonstick. I still butter it but cleanup is a breeze in the sink with soap and warm water (don’t put it in the dishwasher).
I don’t have almond flour (can’t buy it,vshelves are empty bc of the quarantine) so can I use a cup of ap flour instead?
HI Tanya, you can use any other ground nut if you have them. If you don’t have any other nuts you can substitute flour. If you have cake flour, try that. If you only have AP flour I would use about 1/3 of a cup rather than 1/2 a cup. The almond flour doesn’t add gluten to the recipe so using only ap flour might make the madeleines a little more dense. So either use another nut, cake flour or a little less ap flour. Let me know how it works out.
Hello! I tried this recipe and they came out very very dark and dense. I used all of the same ingredients and quantities, is there something I did wrong? Thank you!
Is your madeleine pan a dark color? Also, check if your oven is calibrated to the correct temp.
Hi! These look perfect! Quick question: Can I use ALL almond flour instead of 1/2 regular and 1/2 almond flour?
I haven’t tried it so I can’t say what the results would be. I’m guessing they’d be more dense, like a flourless cake. Without the structure from the flour they probably won’t hold as much air.
I’m excited to try these, but my Madeline pan is silicone – Do I still need to grease and flour it?
Hi Jennifer. I would guess not, but I haven’t used that type of pan. I looked at a few silicone Madeleine pans on line and people noted that they didn’t need to be greased. Happy Holidays!
I have one too, you won’t need to grease or flour it at all.
Try
They’re great!!
I absolutely adore Madeleines. Such beautiful, yummy little cookies!
Me too, Shannon.