Canelés

     Canelés"cah-nah-lays", The Canelé de Bordeaux or Cannelé Bordelais was born in Bordeaus, France.  It is a mini cake dark caramel crunchy outside with an egg custard inside. They can be serve as breakfast, dessert or snack. I took this challenge from my daughter who is lucky tasting this little bite "from heaven" in Bordeaux a few years ago but she remembers the inside is more cakey.  Mom said, we were hopping on the plane to go to Bordeaux tomorrow.  Daughter said, Sure. Just joking.
     They have a unique shape from copper or silicon moulds.  The copper mould is prefered by bakers to make perfect shiny,crispy, dark mahogany evenly crusts but it is so expensive so I settled with cheap silicon ones.  After mixing, the thin batter needs to be chilled a long time in the fridge-overnight, 24, 36, 48 hours or none at all which I do not know why. A mixture of beeswax & butter or vegetable oil (1:1 by weight)  is used to line the copper mould but butter or oil is good too. Egg and egg yolk or just egg yolk? Baking time? Which temperature ?. Rum or Rum and Grand Marnier?.
     This result is beautiful and tasty Caneles but  I am going to learn from another recipe to see the different. If you get a good result from other recipe please share.

Make 12 caneles:
2 cups whole milk
3 Tbs butter and extra for mould
1 tsp pure vanilla extract or 1/2 vanilla bean
1/2 tsp salt
125 g all purpose flour
250 g sugar
1 whole egg
3 egg yolks
40 cc rum

1. If use vanilla bean, lay it out flat on a cutting board. Slit  along the bean length opened with the tip of a small knife and scrap the flesh and seeds out.
2. In a medium sauce pan, heat milk, butter, vanilla to 175 oF on medium high heat.  Meanwhile, in a large bowl mix flour sugar, salt together.  In a medium bowl, lightly whisk egg and egg yolks together. Whisk a small portion of hot milk into egg mixture, whisk to blend well and slowly add more hot milk. Then whisk hot milk egg mixture to the dry ingredients.  Strain with a medium or fine sieve.  Stir in Rum.  Wash and dry vanilla bean at room temperature; then put it into sugar container to flavor the sugar. Cover and chill the batter in the fridge for 36 hours.
3. Preheat oven 425 oF.  Put the molds in a rimmed baking tray ( or directly on the oven rack/ovenproof wire rack which help baking more even but i do not want to deal with the spill if any), brush them with butter or vegetable oil . Take the batter out and stir it gently but thoroughly.  Fill each mould all most full with batter except 1/8 in to the top. Baking  15 minutes and lower the temp. down to 375 oF and bake until the top very dark caramel about 45 minutes  with convection oven.  Turn the tray one after 30 minutes baking. Remove from oven, wait 1-2 minutes for the steam escaped, use a small knife detach the cakes from the mold gently; turn the mold upside down and the cakes should come out easy. Let they cool down slightly then eat. 

* Check out a few videos of Canele instruction:

• ChefStep : use bread flour,egg yolk and no resting time, baking 375 oF convection oven / 45 minutes
• The Real Deal : use a mixture of all purpose flour, cornstarch and egg yolk, baking 410 oF/45 minutes