Authentic Palets de Dames Recipe
Nord, France
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Introduction & history
The preparation starts by creaming butter and sugar, then once pale and fluffy, adding the eggs one by one, followed by flour and rum-soaked currants. The soft, buttery cookie dough then needs to be well-chilled before it is scooped out and baked. Once baked, palets de dames can be either dipped flat bottom down into the icing — usually a mixture of powdered sugar, egg whites, vanilla, and a few drops of lemon juice — while some find it much easier to use an off-set spatula and frost the rounded cookie tops by hand.
Cooking tips
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method
In most recipes, currants are added to the batter but traditionally are only placed on top of cookies before baking. However, palets de dames are also often prepared plain, but currants can also be both in the batter and on top of cookies. For best results, some chefs advise that the dough must be chilled before being baked, a step you can skip if you’re pressed for time. To help make the cookies ... Read more -
variations
More often than not, palets de dames have no icing at all. Nevertheless, when they do, traditionally, it is a glaze made only with icing sugar and a few drops of lemon juice that sometimes also includes milk. Another popular option is to glaze the cookies with apricot jam before applying the icing. Before applying the glaze, cookies must be completely cooled, and you have to allow the icing to set ... Read more -
storage
The cookies are best when eaten the day they are prepared and should be served with coffee or tea. If you have any leftovers, store them in an airtight, preferably iron container, and they will keep for a few days.
Recipe variations
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Palets de Lille by Dorie Greenspan
Ready in 2h 25minIn Lille, palets de dames can be found in all sizes in every pâtisserie, and they are traditionally glazed with plain confectioners’ sugar icing. To make them even more appealing, you can try adding food coloring to the icing or speckling the still-wet glaze with sanding sugar. This recipe was adapted from Dorie Greenspan's Baking Chez Moi.
Larousse Gastronomique's Palets de Dames
PREP 15min
COOK 20min
RESTING 1h 20min
READY IN 1h 55min
This recipe is adapted from Larousse Gastronomique and features the traditional variety of these delicious cookies which are studded with rum-soaked currants.
Ingredients
75g (2.6 oz) currants, soaked in rum
125g (4 oz) softened butter
125g (4 oz) caster (superfine) sugar.
2 eggs
150g (5.3 oz) plain (all-purpose) flour
pinch of salt
Preparation
Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F.
Mix the butter with sugar. Work with a whisk, then blend in the eggs, one after another, and mix well.
Then add the flour, currants with the rum, and a pinch of salt into the butter mixture. Mix thoroughly.
Butter a baking sheet, dust it lightly with flour, and arrange small, evenly sized balls (2 teaspoons of mixture per ball) of the mixture on the sheet, well separated from one another.
Bake for about 20 minutes or until the edges of the palets are golden. Take out of the oven and out of the baking sheet, let cool, then serve.
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