Friands

Fananciers or Friands as they are otherwise known are something I have always wanted to bake but never really got around to and honestly I thought they would be quite fiddly. However a craving for almond meal encouraged me to try baking these little treats and here's the big news..... If you have a good recipe they're easy!. the big thing with friands I have found is getting the ratio of almond meal to flour right. I prefer them to be heavy on the almond meal so I played with my recipe a few times until I had come up with this recipe which gave me the consistency I was after.

Be warned, reducing the butter content in the recipe has disastrous results so just don't look as you pour it in. Friands are rich and moist and the butter plays a big part in that. So here it is, my recipe for Fananciers

3 cups almond meal

½ cup flour
1 ¼  cups pure icing sugar (sifted)
8 egg whites
250g butter (melted)

2 heaped teaspoons of baking powder

First step is to melt your butter and set it aside to cool. Then you need to  put all your dry ingredients into a a big mixing bowl and stir them up so they are all mixed together.

separate the whites from 8 large eggs and slowly add them to your dry mix, whisking as you go. your cooled butter can be added now while whisking. at the end of this process you should have a well combined shiny batter.

At this point you can add anything you like to the batter, one of my favorites it some fresh lemon zest. or you can just pop a some fresh berries on top of each friand, it really is up to you.

You can buy friand molds or trays which I am yet to do so I have baked these in small muffin trays which need to be greased first. bake them in a hot oven for about 20 mins or until a they are golden and cooked through. test with a skewer or by tapping the top to see if it bounces back.