Eggless Saffron Pistachio Halwa Madeleines

Eggless Saffron Pistachio Halwa Madeleines … one bite into these and the indulgence hits you. At three different times, 3 different people gave me similar feedback. One said halwa, another said laddoo, while a third said wow, like halwa, so good! So here we are, halwa madeleines.

One of my favourite ingredients to play around with in baking is saffron, and as I write this, the list of favourites just seems to multiply. Living in the Indian subcontinent is a blessing for people like me who enjoy the colours and chaos! There’s always something happening, a season change, or the onset of the festive season, often both together.

We’re blessed with local ingredients and flavours, local cuisines and a long year dotted with festivals. It’s enough to inspire anyone to constantly want to play with ingredients like saffron, pistachios, rose petals, ghee, almonds … as I said, the list is infinite, seems to multiply.

A while ago I made some Eggless Lime Madeleines which turned out really special. I think there’s some magic that gets created when almond meal and ghee come together, a certain indulgence. I’ve seen it in happen with my Wholegrain Mawa Cake, a cake that’s been tried several times by folk.

With a blog that’s constantly hungry, I keep thinking of new food to feed it. These madeleines were the result of this. Also the result of some rather fine saffron that I recently used from Urban Platter as I worked some recipes for them.

The Saffron Pistachio Vegan Coconut Pudding turned out rather special. I think I’ll share it next, but for now, these little halwa babies or rather, these eggless madeleines. If you don’t have a madeleine tray, perhaps make them in a mini muffin tray or even small mini tart tins.

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Eggless Saffron Pistachio Halwa Madeleines

Simple, staple ingredients and oh-so-festive, these Eggless Saffron Pistachio Halwa Madeleines are small treats perfect for tea time. Dip them into dark chocolate or perhaps white chocolate, else serve them as they are, fresh out of the oven. They are delicious warm when the flavours really play their magic, and great at room temperature too.

Keyword baking, chocolate, dessert, eggless, homemade, sweet

Prep Time 10 minutes minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes minutes

Total Time 30 minutes minutes

Servings 16 madeleines

Ingredients

Dry mix

• 40 g almond meal
• 100 g all purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• Pinch salt
• 2 tbsp chopped pistachios

Wet mix

• 120 ml milk room temperature
• 100 g honey
• 70 g Ghee/ clarified butter melted, tepid
• pinch Generoussaffron

To dip

• 50 g dark couverture chocolate melted
• 2 tbsp finely chopped pistachios

Instructions

• Preheat the oven to 180C degrees.
• Sparingly grease a 12 mold madeleines pan with ghee, and dust with flour.
• In a large bowl, sift the almond meal, all purpose flour, salt and baking powder. Stir through the chopped pistachios.
• ln another larger bowl, heat the ghee slightly {microwave for 30 seconds} and steep the saffron in it. Whisk in the honey, followed by the milk.
• Stir the dry mix into the wet mix, stand for 5 minutes, then ladle into the mold.
• Bake for 18-20 minutes until a toothpick tester comes out clean.
• Turn gently onto a cooling rack, and cool completely.
• Dip into melted dark chocolate and finely chopped pistachios if desired, then leave to set.