Les Madeleines a la Marie Claire idees

For almost twenty years I have subscribed to a French craft magazine-
Marie Claire idees, an offshoot of the original French Marie Claire fashion magazine. It is an amazing magazine with enough projects displayed like so much glorious eye candyin each issue  to keep a dozen crafty people busy for weeks. Add to that the natural savoir faire of French style and you've got the craft publication of my dreams.

Interestingly, lo these many years I have virtually ignored the recipe section that appears in each issue. Weird, n'est pas? This omission has been corrected in the last few weeks as I have combed my back issues selecting recipes that seemed plausible for translation and production. Now, don't get all impressed with the idea of me "translating" the recipes. Over the years my French skills have dwindled to the level of a two year old native speaker, but I do know recipes and French food vocabulary and with my trusty Larousse Dictionnaire Compact Francais-Anglais translating the occasional recipe has become one of my favorite nocturnal activities.

I started with a lentil & sausage soup recipe, and except for the fact that the type of sausage called for in the recipe was "la saucisse de Morteau" and, of course, quite unobtainable for me.

To quote Wikipedia-
"The saucisse de Morteau, also known as the Belle de Morteau, is a traditional smoked sausage from the Morteau region of France (in the department of Doubs in Franche-Comté). It is smoked in traditional pyramidal chimneys, called tuyés. It is a very strongly flavoured and very dense uncooked sausage.
It is produced on the plateau and in the mountains of the Jura mountains in the Doubs at an altitude greater than 600 metres. The city of Morteau is at the centre of this artisanal industry.
Morteau sausage is produced using only pork from the Franche-Comté, because in this mountainous region the animals are fattened traditionally. In addition, to be permitted to use the label "Saucisse de Morteau", the sausages must be smoked for at least 48 h with sawdust from conifer and juniper within the tuyé."
And, it (the sausage) even has its own website! After comparing the recipe with one from Ina Garten, I executed it quite handily with chicken-herb sausage from Trader Joe's and happily had leftovers for days afterward.

Late night translation

Then it occurred to me that there really wasn't much sport in doing a soup or stew or meat or vegetable dish, because you can fudge on the quantities all you want and still end up with a delicious product. It was baking where the challenge really lies- juggling measurements weighed in grams against cups and tablespoons as well as the difference in flours, sugars, baking chemicals, etc.

So last night I translated a madeleine recipe from Septembre 1997, sought council From Julia Child's Kitchen, and an Epicurious recipe referred to in a comment on Smitten Kitchen, and I was off to the proverbial races. I dragged out my quasi antique (c. 1976) madeleine molds, plucked a Meyer lemon off a low hanging branch and started beating those eggs and melting that butter. While I tried to be as true to the Marie Claire recipe as I could; it, like many recipes from non-foodie magazines, left a lot up to the baker and the imagination. I weighed everything and then poured it into cups for English measurements which had to be rounded off, and purloined the amounts of vanilla and baking powder from the American recipes. Julia, of course, would not think of adulterating her genoise (spongecake) based madeleines with chemical leavening, but for me, at least, a little baking powder is a much needed ace in the hole, and Marie Claire obviously felt the same way. I also used cake flour to ensure a tender result.

My new best friend

Here are the results-
Les Madeleines a la Marie Claire Plus
Makes 36 madeleine mini-cakes

Make sure that all your ingredients are at room temperature to prevent the butter from solidifying too soon. The batter needs to be refrigerated for at least an hour before baking.

3/4 cup butter + 3 Tb for the pans
1 cup cake flour (unsifted)
1 cup unbleached white flour (unsifted)
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
5 (large) eggs at room temperature
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup sugar
2 tsp grated lemon zest (about what you get from one lemon)
2 tb flour for the pans
Optional: powdered sugar

1 or 2 madeleine pans- the fewer you have, the more batches you have to bake

My non-traditional scallop shaped mold

Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat until it just starts to brown. (This could take 10-15 minutes.) Pour it into a small glass measuring cup to cool to lukewarm while you mix the rest of the batter. Stir together the cake flour, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl and set aside.

Beat the eggs at high speed in an electric mixer until light and foamy- about 30 seconds, then beat in the vanilla and lemon zest. With the mixer still at high speed, gradually add the sugar and continue beating about three minutes, until the mixture is tripled in volume and looks thick and creamy. Stop the mixer to fold in the flour by hand. Sift the flour in three or four batches over the eggs and fold in each batch until just combined. (But, gently break up any lumps that form.) Then fold in the butter.

Cover the batter and refrigerate for one hour or more.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Stir the additional 3 Tb of melted butter and 2 Tb of flour together and use a pastry brush to apply it to the madeleine molds, picking up any excess that settles in the molds. Spoon a heaping tablespoon of batter into each mold. In order to achieve the classic "hump" in the center, do not spread or smooth.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 12-15 minutes (check after 10 minutes) until they are golden around the edges and firm in the center. Let cool for a minute or two in the pans and then use a table knife to gently dislodge each madeleine for final cooling on a rack.

Store airtight and serve as soon as possible or freeze. May be dusted with a little powdered sugar.

Ta Dah!!

Now, these still aren't quite as tender as the madeleines of my dreams, so next time its beat the eggs & sugar longer and bake at 375 degrees. We'll see what results.