Madeleine
Madeleines are small, light sponge cakes characterized by their particular shape: they are baked in scallop-shaped molds which give them their distinct elongated shell shape: ridged on one side, and plump on the other.
Although the origin is debated, it is believed they are named after Madeleine Paumier, a servant of Stanislaw Leszczyński, the eighteenth-century duke of Lorraine, who had his residence in the town of Commercy that is part of the Lorraine region. Supposedly, Madeleine baked the little cakes in 1755 when Stanislaw’s pastry cook had left the dinner without a dessert after an argument with his intendant. When Stanislaw was told that Madeleine had baked the little cakes, he declared that they should be named after her.
Yet, an alternative explanation of the name of these little cakes refers to a very different Madeleine. Madeleine after all, is also the French name for Saint Mary Magdalene. In the New Testament she is described as one of the followers of Jesus who witnessed his crucifixion and entombment, and the first to see Jesus after his resurrection. Several orders of nuns have adopted her name while the scallop-shell shape has also become the traditional symbol of Catholic pilgrimage, such as the Pilgrimage of Compostela where pilgrims are given such a shell. This would suggest that perhaps madeleines were originally baked with a more religious purpose in mind.
In In Search of Lost Time, Marcel too seems to be familiar with this religious connotation as he describes them as ‘(…) those squat, plump little cakes called “petites madeleines,” which look as though they had been moulded in the fluted scallop of a pilgrim’s shell.’ Again later on, he points out that they are ‘so richly sensual under [their] severe, religious folds.’