The History of Madeleines

The shape, texture, and flavor of this little scallop-shell of pastry has inspired all sorts of creative works, not least of which are the theories about its origin.

The most famous of these stories features a famous gourmet, Stanislas Leszczynski, the former king of Poland. The scene played out in 1755 at his château at Commercy, in Lorraine, on the occasion of one of the great celebrations he so enjoyed. On that day, the pastry cook in charge of the kitchen lost his temper and handed in his apron. Despite this, when it was time for dessert, the king and his court were able to enjoy some delicious, shell-shaped cakes. Stanislas asked who had created them. It was a young servant whose name was Madeleine, and the little cake was given her name by royal command. Curiously, in that same year, Menon (A 18th century cookbook author) quotes a recipe for a madeleine in his Soupers de la cour.

Another story credits the invention of this delicacy to Avice, pastry cook to the Prince de Talleyrand. Avice is supposed to have had the idea of baking a pound cake, with equal measures of butter, sugar, flour, and eggs - known at the time as tôt-fait (french for "quickly made") - in a shell-shaped aspic mold.

Among the ranks of other possible inventors is Madeleine Simonin, who was the personal cook to Cardinal Retz when he withdrew to the château of Commercy in 1661. No matter the inventor, the cake has inspired many a tale, including a lengthy mention in Alexandre Dumas's Grand Dictionnaire de cuisine. Manifestly inspired, Dumas in fact tells a long story about the madeleine.

In a scene worthy of The Three Musketeers, he recounts an adventure of one of his friends who visited Strasbourg. The traveler lost his way and sought somewhere to stay the night. Eventually he knocked on the door of a man whose face was heavily coated in flour, with a tangled head of hair and beard, who was naked to the waist. After a gruff exchange of words, his host offered him for dinner a small basket containing around a dozen little oval shaped cakes that were a nice golden colour. Dumas's friend learned that he had reached Commercy, which remains the undisputed capital of the madeleine. No doubt this town was indeed the first place to find them, curious though that madeleine molds where supposedly found among cookware in the ruins of Pompeii.

Credit:

Pierre Herme Pastries

Information sources:

Pierre Herme Pastries

Mots de table

mots de bouche

grand dictionnaire

Wikipedia

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