When I posted the picture for these english madeleines on instagram I mentioned that my house smelled of my childhood. And it surely did. In fact when I was washing the cupcake pan, it still smelled of the memories from my younger days, even though the madeleines had been removed and set aside a while back.
My mother used to make them when I was a kid. My brother and I loved them – bite after bite of buttery goodness. Although the original recipe calls for baking the batter in Dariole Moulds, my mom used to make them shaped like a regular cupcake- since she did not own a dariole mould. And then bathed them in jam and desiccated coconut. So I made them the same way in cupcake pans- not because I do not own dariole moulds (I actually don’t) but because that’s they way I remember english madeleines to be.