Cooking Class Recipe: Corn Madeleines with Caviar and Sour Cream
You may notice this is the blog post in the last week that includes caviar. Can Valentine's Day be far behind? The little shell-shaped cakes called Madeleines are usually sweets, but here become tasty little corn-bready conveyances for caviar and sour cream. When we make them in our recreational cooking classes, a hush usually falls over the room when the students take the first bite. Yes, they are that good. As with many recipes calling for caviar, you don't have to go out and buy beluga to make it tasty; there are some very good domestic caviars on the market at reasonable prices.
Makes about 36 hors d'oeuvres
Ingredients
1 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted, plus additional for brushing molds
1/3 C yellow cornmeal (not coarse)\2 Tbsp all-purpose flour
½ Tsp sugar
¼ Tsp baking soda
¼ Tsp salt
1/8 Tsp black pepper
1 large egg
1/3 C well-shaken buttermilk
½ C frozen corn, thawed and chopped
1/3 C sour cream
½ Oz caviar
Chopped fresh chives
Method
Preheat oven to 400°F. Brush Madeleine molds with some melted butter.
Whisk together cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and pepper in a bowl. Whisk together egg, buttermilk, 1 Tbsp melted butter, and corn in another bowl, then add to dry ingredients, stirring until just combined.
Spoon 1 Tsp batter into each mold and bake in middle of oven until madeleines are golden around edges and spring back when pressed lightly, 5 to 6 minutes. Turn madeleines out onto a rack to cool and make more in same manner.
Spoon about ½ tsp. sour cream onto each madeleine, then top with a rounded ¼ tsp. caviar. Garnish with fresh chives.
