I grew up celebrating Easter with my mom’s side of the family, the sweet southern side if you will. Every year we would gather at my grandmother’s or my aunt’s home, to feast on amazing home cooked food. Honey baked ham, biscuits, quiche, iced tea, mimosas and a variety of desserts were often center stage at our Easter brunch. The whimsically decorated confections and candies colored in spring pastels, were always considered the highlight of the meal. The place settings and flowers were always beautiful, reminiscent of a tea party and one couldn’t help but get into the spirit of Easter. For some reason, I have no memories of the men in our family being present at these lovely gatherings. Perhaps they were hiding in a corner somewhere until mealtime was announced.
I searched the internet for Easter dessert inspiration. I was on the hunt for something delicate, feminine and sophisticated. Finally, I landed on the French madeleine cookie. Their beautiful shell shape and cake like texture was intriguing. Having never made these cookies before, despite having the cake mold pans for years, I was a bit intimidated.
Madeleine cookies have a reputation for being difficult to make. In fact, I never even made them in culinary school. This may have been our instructor’s decision due more to our inabilities than to the cookie itself. Our class was notorious for making many mistakes. Luckily, one of the pearls of wisdom we learned in baking class was, almost any dessert faux pas can be turned into bread pudding. Needless to say, our class hit an all time record for bread pudding sales at our cafeteria.
Though this recipe does require at least one hour of time, not to mention cleanup, I found the process quite approachable. Madeleine cookies are actually more cake like than they are cookie. They rely on whipped egg whites for their volume, making mixing and folding challenging, as you don’t want to overdo it. If you over mix, they will come out tough, almost dry tasting. Finding the correct finesse to properly incorporate the ingredients while still maintaining the volume of the egg whites, may require a couple of attempts; but hang in there as these cookies are well worth the effort.
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