While in New York recently we were lucky enough to be able to dine at Daniel Boulud’s restaurant Daniel. It goes without saying, for a restaurant ranked number 11 in the world by the S. Pelligrino World’s 50 Best Restaraunts that the food would be amazing, and amazing it was. In fact, it was the best meal of my life, but more on that in a future post, along with a sneak peak inside the kitchen at Daniel, which the team at Daniel were so kind to allow me into to take some photos.
After our meal, while we were enjoying a cup of tea and coffee, our waiter Javier brought out freshly baked orange madeleines (along with handmade chocolates and petit fours). Sadly, by this point (actually well before) we were unable to eat anymore of the delicious food because there was just SO much. Javier said that wasn’t a problem and packed up the madeleines and petit fours for us to take with us.
The madeleines made a wonderful breakfast the next morning, and were bursting with orange flavour, but not overwhelmingly so. My fiancé quickly dubbed them amazing, as he munched on one, as was everything else we enjoyed from restaurant Daniel. So I knew when we got home I wanted to try to reproduce them, given I knew I had little hope of reproducing some of the other dishes we enjoyed that night.
The madeleines from restaurant Daniel were miniatures, but I made large ones as I don’t have a miniature madeleine tray. At least with large madeleines you don’t feel so guilty for saying you had 1 or 2 madeleines instead of 4 mini ones.
So, have you been inspired to recreate a dessert you have enjoyed at a restaurant at home? How did it go?
Orange Madeleines
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup plain flour all-purpose
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- Pinch of salt
- 1/3 cup of caster sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
- finely grated zest of 1 orange
- 2 tablespoons of freshly squeezed orange juice
- 80 g of butter melted
Instructions
- Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt and set aside.
- In a mixer fitted with a whisk attachment add the sugar and orange zest and mix on the lowest setting until the sugar and zest are well combined and the sugar begins to take on an orange hue.
- Add the eggs and whisk until the sugar is dissolved and the mixture becomes light and fluffy.
- Switch the mixer to it’s lowest setting and gently add the flour and vanilla extract and mix until just combined.
- Add the melted butter and orange juice and mix until just combined.
- Cover the bowl with cling film and refrigerate for 1 to 2 hours.
- Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius (355 Fahrenheit).
- Grease and flour your madeleine pan and 2/3 fill with the batter and bake for 8 to 10 minutes or until cooked.
- To serve you may like to dust with icing sugar.
Nutrition
