In a previous post (here), I baked madeleine cakes with all purpose flour. They came out delicious! However, the cakes turned sticky in room temperature overnight. So I searched online for other recipes which deliver drier cakes. Here is the almond flour madeleine.
Whenever you use flour, you can also use almond flour. Almond flour behaves a little differently compared to regular flour because it lacks gluten. Gluten makes it possible for yeast dough to rise as the gluten forms a network of small walls that hold gas trapped in the dough. Gluten also acts as a binder in the dough and makes it easier to handle. When baking with yeast, you can replace 10-20% of the wheat flour with almond flour. You should then also increase the amount of liquid by about 5-10%.
When not baking with yeast, you can replace up to 100% of the flour. As almond flour has such a high fiber content, it will soak up more liquid, up to twice as much as other types of flour. You should therefore reduce the amount of almond flour to 50-60% of the original amount of flour, or increase the amount of liquid in the recipe.
You need Madeleine pan (here for sale at $13.25)!
Preheat an oven to 355°F. Using a pastry brush, heavily brush softened butter over each of all the molds in a madeleine pan, carefully buttering every ridge. Dust the molds with flour, tilting the pan to coat the surfaces evenly. Turn the pan upside down and tap it gently to dislodge the excess flour.
Mix butter and sugar using electric mixer on medium-high speed. Add eggs (one each time) and beat vigorously, about 3 minutes. Beat in the orange zest and heavy cream (or water, orange juicy). Sprinkle the sifted flour over the egg mixture and stir or beat on low speed to incorporate.
Divide the batter among the prepared molds. Bake the madeleines until the tops spring back when lightly touched, 15 to 18 minutes.
Remove the pan from the oven and invert it over a wire rack, then rap it on the rack to release the madeleines. If any should stick, use your fingers to loosen the edges, being careful not to touch the hot pan, and invert and rap again.
Let the madeleines cool on the rack for 10 minutes. Using a fine-mesh sieve, dust the tops with confectioners sugar and serve.
I will definitely try this recipe. I make madeleine cakes often, as you said they are delicious and kids love them. But they do turn sticky in room temperature.
Thanks for the recipe! I just tried it yesterday and they came out great. Would you please tell me how many cakes this recipe can make, 12 or 16?