Vegan Madeleines

Vegan Madeleines - Madeleines are traditional french butter cakes made with lots of butter, milk, eggs and sugar. Not really healthy, huh?

But since everybody in my family loves them, I always wanted to create my own, healthier recipe for madeleines. The classic recipe is a little bit tricky, so I couldn’t imagine a healthier version coming out just as good as the original. But I was so wrong! After some attempts, I finally created a recipe that works every single time and it’s even much easier than the classic one!

The recipe is very basic which allows you to play up with the flavors. Here’s the original version (vanilla with a hint of orange), a matcha version and a chocolate version. You can even add berries or chocolate chips, if you like.

I used sunflower seeds oil instead of butter (you can use any neutral oil of choice), skipped the eggs and replaced the milk with freshly squeezed orange juice (for the vanilla version) and almond milk for the matcha and the chocolate version.

You can find many different madeleine molds online. I think that this one is very cute:) You can also use this recipe to make mini muffins.

For the matcha version, I added 1tbsp of pure matcha powder and for the chocolate version, 1 tbsp of good quality cacao powder.

For the matcha version, I added 1tbsp of pure matcha powder and for the chocolate version, 1 tbsp of good quality cacao powder.

Equipment

Madeleines mold /mini muffin mold ; food processor optional

Ingredients

• 350 grams cake flour sifted
• 180 grams light brown sugar
• 200 ml water
• 1 tsp vanilla bean paste
• 100 ml neutral oil like sunflower seeds / canola oil
• 200 ml fresh organic orange juice
• zest of 2 organic oranges
• 8 grams baking powder

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 180C degrees.
2. Grease a madeleines pan with oil/ butter.
3. Place the water and orange juice in a bowl of a food processor (or place the ingredients in a bowl and combine with a whisk). Add the sugar and whisk until completely dissolved.
4. With the machine working, slowly add the oil and whisk until fully combined.
5. Add the vanilla and whisk to combine.
6. Add the flour, baking powder and orange zest and keep whisking until smooth.
7. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Notes

• To make it gluten-free, replace cake flour with 175g potato flour and 175g corn starch.
• For the matcha version, add1 tbsp matcha powder and replace orange juice with non-dairy milk (I used almond). Orange zest is also not required.
• For the chocolate version, add 1 tbsp raw cacao powder and replace orange juice with non-dairy milk (I used almond). Orange zest can be used if you like.
• The food processor simplifies the method but it’s totally fine to whisk the ingredients by hand.