Made(leines) in the U.S.A.

Everyone who knows me at first thinks I picked up my love of madeleines in France. After all I spent a bit of time there and went to a bakery or two every day.
But it wasn't love at first sight. It wasn't even first sight. I didn't notice the little cakes shaped like elongated scallop shells when I was in Aix or Paris or Marseilles or Nice. No, it was the flashier tartes and chocolate endowed cakes such as opera cake and the laminated layers of the croissants that called to me from behind the glass at the patisseries.

It wasn't until I came across a package of mass-produced madeleines at Fairway on the Upper West Side of Manhattan that I discovered these little cuties. They didn't blow me away, but I was charmed by the size and shape.

Around that time there must have been a fad for madeleines because I suddenly came across madeleine recipes from Bon Appetit and The New York Times. I can't resist a do-it-yourself project (ask me sometime about my homemade tofu) and decided to give it a go. Fresh from the oven, my own madeleines were in a completely different category from the ones wrapped in cellophane at the supermarket. The home-baked ones were buttery, a little nutty, with a slight crispness at the edges that dared to be dipped into a cup of coffee or tea.

Out of a batch of two dozen, there were about five left after an hour. After five hours, only the lingering fragrance of toasted butter hinted at their existence.

If I had shared, they might not have lasted so long.

Since then, madeleines are something I just throw together, the way the mother of one of my first grader's friends might throw together a batch of Tollhouse cookies.

Sometimes I mix in ground almonds or hazelnuts. Other times I fold in lemon zest or chopped candied orange peel that I've made. The most popular variation that I've given away (I KNOW! Sometimes I actually have some left) is the one with the hidden lump of Valrhona chocolate that I tuck into the batter. To me they're all good.

The only caveat is that the little cakes (technically a variation on a genoise) tend to get dry after a day. That's what madeleines do. Normally I'd shrug -- as if they'd ever sit uneaten that long. But I sometimes do mail them a thousand miles to my mother-in-law or my sister, so occasionally I need them to stay a bit moister for a just a few days.

One of my favorite additions to baked goods is sour cream, and this is no exception. In my version of madeleines, sour cream prevents them from totally drying out before reaching their destination. (Besides, the surprise of dark chocolate in the center distracts people from noticing any flaws.) Then, when they are ready to be eaten, all they need is about a minute in an oven to restore a bit of crispness to the edges.

Recipe

Chocolate Surprise Madeleines

yield: 24

INGREDIENTS
pinch salt
3 large eggs
1 egg yolk
2/3 c. sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 c. plus 1 Tbsp cake flour
1 stick butter, melted and cooled
2 Tbsp. sour cream
24 Valrhona chocolate feves* (I like one of the  61% chocolates), optional
(other options: 1 Tbsp. grated lemon zest or chopped candied orange peel, or 2 tsp orange flower water)

Note: Butter and flour madeleine molds (I do it even if they are nonstick)
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F


1. Beat eggs and yolk with salt until doubled or tripled in volume.

2. Still beating, add sugar and vanilla until incorporated.

3. Gently fold in cake flour.

4. In bowl, combine butter and 1/4 c. to 1/2 c. of the batter. Incorporate sour cream into butter-batter mixture.

5. Fold butter-batter mixture into remaining batter.

6. Fill madeleine molds 3/4 full.

7. Lightly press a piece of chocolate into each madeleine. You can bake with the chocolate showing, but I like to use the back of a spoon or small spatula to pull some batter over the chocolate to hide it. I think it looks better with the chocolate hidden.

8. Bake at 425 degrees F for 4 minutes, then reduce oven temperature to 375 degrees F. and continue baking until edges turn golden brown, anywhere from 4 to 8 minutes more depending on the oven.

9. Allow madeleines to cool in mold about a minute, then remove to cooling rack.


Note:
*Jacques Torres baking disks would be a good substitute for Valrhona feves. If you don't like dark chocolate but love milk chocolate, then bien sur, use milk chocolate.

Speculoos for you

I first came across these spice cookies one November during a visit in Lille, France, near the border with Belgium. During the day my host would go to work, leaving me to explore (ie. sip un cafe, watch passersby and then troll every food establishment or market in town, practically drooling over all the goodies I couldn't get back home).

I would make at least a daily trip (often twice daily) to one of the boulangerie/patisseries — after all, I had to keep up my strength so as not to wither in the chill weather of this small northern city.

Normally I favor treats typically associated with France — croissant au beurre, tarte Tatin, etc. But even though speculoos are just humble spice cookies, somehow the bakeries over there elevated them into something delicately buttery and wonderful. I don’t think I’ll buy a supermarket gingersnap again.

It's been years since I've seen or made these. I had all but forgotton these cookies, which I think are traditionally made for the holiday season, until I took a look this week at a potential job translating a few recipes from French to English. One of the recipes called a crumble topping made of crushed speculoos.

The problem is they're not so accessible to us here in the states. I guess you could substitute store-bought gingersnaps (meh) or some Swedish pepparkakor from Ikea (I've heard they weren't bad).

But why not make a batch of speculoos and have the extra on hand for that certain time in the afternoon when the stomach starts to feel hollow but dinner is still so far away ...

This recipe is a combination of one from www.labonnecuisine.be and another from a friend’s mother in Maubeuge, also northern France. I've included the French version as well as my English translation.

Speculoos
(biscuits des Flandres)

INGREDIENTS

150 g de beurre
300 g de cassonade brune
1 oeuf
1 cuillerée  à café de mélange d'épices (cannelle et girofle moulu).
1 cuilleree (ou au pif) a cafe de zeste de citron*
sel (environs demi cuilleree a cafe)
500 g de farine**

 PREPARATION

   1. Mélangez le beurre, la cassonade brune, l'oeuf, les épices, le sel et le zeste de citron, si on le veut, dans un saladier.  Incorporez progressivement la farine. Laissez reposer la pâte au moins une heure au refrigirateur.

2. Faites plusieurs morceaux de la pâte.

3. Prechauffer le four a 175° C, et saupoudrez un moule*** de farine.

4. Remplissez-le de pâte et éliminez ce qui dépasse (avec un couteau).

5. D'un geste sec, retournez le moule sur une plaque de cuisson couvert de papier sulfurisé.  Recommencez l'opération  avec les autres morceaux de pâte.

6. Enfournez la plaque au four.

7. Laissez cuire environ 10-13 minutes.

Pour 24 a 48 biscuits, environ


ENGLISH TRANSLATION:

Speculoos
(Flemish spice cookies, similar to Swedish pepparkakor)
copyright Cynthia Ohms ©   

INGREDIENTS

300 g (1 ½ c) brown sugar
150 g (10.5 Tbs -- or 1 stick plus 2.5 Tbs) butter
1 large egg
1 teaspoon of holiday spices, (usually ground cinnamon and a pinch of ground clove, often also ginger)
1 teaspoon lemon zest*
½ tsp salt
500 g (about 4 cups) flour**
   
PREPARATION

1. In a large bowl, mix the sugar, butter, egg, spices and salt until combined. Gradually mix in the flour (eg. In three to four batches) until combined. The mixture will form a thick dough. Place dough in refrigerator to rest at least one hour.

2. Divide dough into several pieces, according to the size of the mold(s)*** to be used.

3. Preheat oven to 175 C / 350 F, and dust speculoos mold(s) with flour.
Press dough into the mold, and cut off excess with a small knife.
With a sharp snap, flip the mold onto a parchment-lined baking sheet and carefully lift from cookie. Repeat with remaining pieces of dough.

4. Place sheet of cookies into preheated oven and bake about 10-13 minutes, adjusting time based on the oven.
Remove when edges begin to darken.

Makes about 24 to 48 cookies depending on size of mold or cookie cutters

Baker’s notes:

*Besides adjusting the spices to personal taste (I don't like too much clove), I sometimes like to add lemon zest, even if it isn't traditional.

**Even in residential / home kitchens, a scale is invaluable for accurate and consistent baking results, especially when quantities of dry ingredients exceed 2 cups. When measuring flour, for instance, depending on the texture of the batch of flour, the amount of air in the product and the ambient humidity, the true amount measured at different times can vary considerably, even for a single cook using the same cup measures. I like to use an Oxo scale, and there also are many other affordable options available through retailers carrying home goods.

***Speculoos are a regional specialty (Belgium and northern France), so the molds are not easily found in the U.S.
No mold? Just divide the dough into two halves, rolling out each portion to just over eighth of an inch thick on a sheet of parchment paper and using cookie cutters to make desired shapes, such as stars and gingerbread people. If planning to use the cookies as a crumble topping or a substitute for graham crackers in a crust, then decorative shapes are unnecessary. Just cut rectangular or diamond shapes with a knife and lift cookies onto a parchment-lined sheet for baking.

I love Paris

A little more than a month before my husband and I got engaged, we took a trip to Paris, which I think is my favorite city in the world after New York. He loves good food and had taken a weeklong course in French cooking at Peter Kumpf's New York Cooking School (which is now the Institute for Culinary Education, in Manhattan). Still, he had never gotten around to visiting a country that geographically is so small but is a giant when it comes to good LIVING (like Italy, Spain, etc. Something to do with the Romans? I couldn't say).

We just had to go. I had been to France several times, including my semester in Aix-en-Provence, and it seemed like such a waste not to use what I had learned of the language and culture. (I’d never be an interpreter at the U.N., so then what exactly had I spent those years studying French for?) We booked a flight and a week at a tiny hotel by the Jardins du Luxembourg in early November.

Our plane descended through gray cloud cover … then we dragged our luggage via the Metro to our hotel’s quartier. When we entered the little lobby (about as big as a lot of walk-in closets in the suburbs), I greeted the woman reading a small book at the front desk, “Bonjour Madame …” But she immediately responded in English, not unfriendly but not terribly friendly either. I continued in French to tell her we had reservations and gave her our names. She insisted she was able to converse in English and told us that our room wouldn't be ready until about 3 or 4 p.m. Ugh, she was sending us out to cool our heels. I told myself, “I don‘t think she likes us very much.”

We were exhausted, D had the beginnings of a cold, but we suddenly had time to kill, so we asked her if she could suggest a place to take lunch.

As we walked toward her recommended spot, I neurotically wondered aloud to D whether the clerk thought my French was bad, or my accent wasn't good enough, or did she think I was the stereotype of the uncouth American? (Overreact much? Hey, I was fried from the trip.) A few blocks away as we approached the dated exterior of the bistro where she had directed us, I thought — out loud this time — “I don‘t think she likes us very much.”

Too tired to roam in search of a more attractive place, I mentally wrote off lunch as an extension of our plane ride — like an airport meal — and we were taken to a dark corner. I ordered a duck leg confit, and D chose fish (when we got it, it looked like a fillet of trout with the skin) served with lentils.

We waited. D sipped his red wine. Minutes passed. We waited a bit more. (Where was that glass of water I'd ordered?) And we waited. Finally, the garcon strode briskly to our table and set our heavy white plates down in front of us. We both took a couple bites. That hotel clerk definitely didn’t like us. She LOVED us.

The duck was as ducky a flavor as you can get, and rich with duck fat. I love that stuff. D's fish was cooked perfectly, moist and succulent with a thin crispy skin, and tapenade of olives lightly dressing it. And underneath was a small bed of well-seasoned lentils, not mushy but tender, each one steadfastly holding its shape.
.
I still think about that meal a decade ago. The stores here don’t carry fresh seafood or duck, and it’s prohibitively expensive for us to order it. But French lentils (lentilles de Puy) I can get, and they play well with so many other things — chorizo, merguez, small lamb shanks — I could go on.

RECIPE

Lentil Stew With Lamb and Sausage
Serves 4

INGREDIENTS
2 Tbs olive oil
5 slices bacon, cut into half-inch pieces
2 small lamb shanks (1 1/2 to 2 pounds)
8 to 12 oz. sausage (merguez, andouille or Palacios chorizo), cut into 2-inch pieces
3 cloves garlic, smashed
3 carrots, cut diagonally into 2-inch pieces
2 stalks of celery, chopped
1 onion (or 2 large shallots), chopped
2 sprigs of fresh rosemary (or 1 tsp dried ground)
3 sprigs fresh thyme (or 1 tsp dried ground)
1 cup dry red wine
4 cups chicken broth
1 Tbs tomato paste (or more to taste)
1 bay leaf
1 1/5 cups lentils, sorted to remove pebbles, and rinsed
salt* (to taste)
1 tsp pepper

PREPARATION
Heat a heavy pot over medium to medium-high heat. Render bacon, then set pieces aside. Add 2 Tbs oil to the bacon fat. Salt and pepper the lamb shanks, brown them, then set aside on a plate. Cover loosely with foil. (If using uncooked sausage, brown it then reserve with shanks, and if using cooked sausage, add it to the pot later with the shanks.)

Saute garlic, carrots, celery and onion until beginning to brown. If using dried herbs, add them to the vegetables and heat less than a minute. (If using fresh herbs, put them in later with the stock.)

Deglaze with the wine, scraping up any fond, or brown bits, from bottom of pot. Stir in lentils, tomato paste, bay leaf and chicken broth. Return shanks with any juices to pot along with bacon and sausage. Bring liquid just to a boil, then lower heat and maintain simmer until lamb shanks are tender, about an hour and half to two hours, depending on the size. If pot needs more liquid, add water.
When cool enough, remove shank bones and discard. Break up meat and stir back into lentils.
Season to taste with salt and fresh ground pepper.

Possible accompaniments: a hunk of fresh baguette; some grated or shaved Parmesan; a dollop of mascarpone.

NOTES:
*I don't necessarily add much salt because many store-bought chicken broths and stocks already are quite salty. If using a homemade or low-salt broth or stock, then add more salt according to taste.

**We usually have extra. Leftover lentils can be stretched with some broth or canned pureed tomato and served with penne or gobbetti (a twisted tube pasta with ridges), which goes well with hearty sauces like this or a red sauce with shredded pork shoulder and sausage.