Financiers (Almond Tea Cakes)

Small brown-butter almond cakes, held together by egg whites and a little wheat flour and topped with fruit or jam. Almond flour supplies fat, moisture and flavour, and almost no structure.

Untested: not yet made in this kitchen. It is here as the showcase for one flour in the Flour section and is adapted from the source named in the Notes.

Ingredients

• 12 tablespoons (170 g) unsalted butter, cold
• 1⅓ cups (128 g) almond flour
• ½ cup (60 g) unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1¾ cups (198 g) confectioners’ sugar, plus extra for dusting
• ½ teaspoon table salt
• 5 large egg whites, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons (43 g) honey
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• Fresh berries, jam or jammy fruit bits for topping

Directions

1. Prepare. Heat the oven to 350 °F and grease a mini-muffin pan.
2. Brown the butter until golden and nutty-smelling. Cool to room temperature.
3. Mix. Stir the almond flour, all-purpose flour, sugar and salt together. Mix in the egg whites, honey, almond extract and brown butter.
4. Fill. Scoop a tablespoon of batter into each cup and top each with a berry or a little jam.
5. Bake 15–18 minutes, until golden at the edge and firm in the middle.
6. Cool 5 minutes in the pan, then on a rack. Dust with sugar.

Notes

Source Adapted from Charlotte Rutledge, “Almond Tea Cakes,” King Arthur Baking, which says these are “also known as financiers or friands.”

Shape The source bakes them in a mini-muffin pan rather than the classic rectangular financier mould.

Why this flour There is twice as much almond flour as wheat flour by weight. Almond flour brings fat and flavour but little structure, so the whites and the small amount of wheat flour hold the cakes together.

Safety Contains tree nuts.

The Flour section of the Food site covers the history, the science, milling, label systems and every flour used here.