Japanese Milky Madeleines

The other day, I gave dear son some chiffon cheese cupcake bought from Four Leaves Bakery as a snack for afternoon tea. The cake was very soft, fluffy, light and not too sweet, he took to it quite well. Then, I bought the Japanese light cheese cake and steamed cake from Breadtalk, but he didn't like it. Well, if I were to compare these three cakes myself, I too would prefer the one from Four Leaves. My son has similar tastebuds as Mummy :p

Anyway, at this age, I should try to give him more homemade food rather than storebought stuff where there may be more preservatives, so decided to bake something for him. Previously had given him tofu and yogurt cheesecake as well as mango cheesecake, the response was just lukewarm. Probably a tad heavy for his tastebuds.

After flipping through Chef Keiko Ishida's Okashi recipe book, decided to go for the Japanese Milky Madeleines as I have all the ingredients on hand.

Ingredients (makes 18 cakes)

• 120g pastry flour (Chef Keiko usually uses Top Flour when in Singapore, but I use Cake Flour this time as I ran out of Top Flour)
• 20g rice flour or corn flour
• 15g milk powder
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 15g honey
• 1 tbsp hot water
• 100g unsalted butter
• 50g double (heavy) cream
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 140g eggs
• Pinch of salt
• 150g Japanese sugar or castor sugar (I cut down to 100g)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 170 degree celsius. Sift together the flours, milk powder and baking powder. Combine honey and hot water in a small bowl.
2. Place butter, cream and vanilla in a bowl and heat over a double boiler until butter is melted. Set aside.
3. In another bowl, beat eggs and salt with a whisk. Add sugar, place the bowl over a double boiler and mix well.
4. When egg mixture is warm, use an electric mixer to beat on high speed until light and fluffy. Reduce speed to medium and continue beating for about 1 minute. Add honey and mix well.
5. Gently fold in flour, milk powder and baking powder mixture with a spatula. Add cream and butter mixture and fold until just incorporated.
6. Pipe/spoon batter into prepared baking cups. Bake for about 20-25 minutes until madeleines are light golden in colour. Cool on a wire rack.

Store madeleines in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days, or up to 1 month in the freezer.

One note on step 4, on beating the mixture to light and fluffy. I'm not sure whether mine was considered fluffy or not coz I reduced the amount of sugar. The batter seemed fluffy, it looked glossy but just couldn't reach soft peak stage no matter how long I beat. After a while, I gave up and left it as it was. Not sure if this impacted the texture of the cake or not.

Anyway, I thought the cake texture turned out quite ok, just like a normal madeleine. But as with a madeleine, the cake was soft and tender when served warm and after it was cold, it turned a little hard and dry. Which reminds me, I don't really like madeleines in the first place because of this reason. I thought Chef Keiko's recipe would turn out different or was it due to the reduced sugar?

Oh well... dear son's taste test was more important. Okay, verdict, he didn't like it either. I believe the same reason as mine, a little dry. I think he likes fluffy and moist cakes like Mummy. Hmmm... I must search for a recipe that is similar to Four Leave's chiffon cheese cupcake! Anyone can give a pointer?