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.
If you love this recipe as much as I do, I’d really appreciate a 5-star review.
Brown Butter Almond Madeleines
Almond Madeleines, are they a cookie or a cake? I don’t care! I only know that they’re so easy to make and even easier to eat.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 sticks (6 oz, 170g) unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup (2.5 oz, 70g)all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup (2 oz, 56g) almond flour or finely ground almonds
- 1/8 teaspoon table salt
- 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (5 oz, 140g) granulated sugar
- 3 large eggs plus 1 large yolk
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
Instructions
- Melt the 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 the flour, almond flour (ground almonds) and salt and set aside.
- Whisk the eggs with the sugar and extracts until the eggs are pale, aerated and leave a "ribbon" when the whisk is drawn through the mix. Fold in the flour with a wire 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. Best eaten slightly warm or within a couple of hours of baking.
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Heather
Wednesday 25th of January 2023
Can I dust the pan with almond flour instead of AP flour?
Eileen Gray
Thursday 26th of January 2023
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.
Myra
Sunday 14th of August 2022
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!
Melissa V
Thursday 6th of January 2022
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!
Allyson
Friday 16th of October 2020
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!
Eileen Gray
Friday 16th of October 2020
The butterfat is already flavored by the browning. I prefer to remove the bits because I don't want that texture in the cookie.
Maribel M.
Tuesday 23rd of June 2020
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.
Eileen Gray
Tuesday 23rd of June 2020
Yes, I mean the almond flour, or ground almonds.