Canelés de Bordeaux

Desserts

Crispy, deeply caramelized crust that is crispy when you bite into it, giving way to a soft, custardy interior that's barely set, almost like a cross between flan and cake. The outside tastes of burnt sugar and rum, dark and complex, whilst the inside is sweet, vanilla-scented, and impossibly tender. They're odd little fluted towers that require more patience than most bakers are willing to give, but when you get them right, they're absolutely brilliant.

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Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 40 minutes mins

Total Time 1 day d 1 hour hr

Servings 16 canelés

Ingredients 

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• 500 ml whole milk
• 50 gr unsalted butter plus extra for greasing
• 1 vanilla pod
• 250 gr caster sugar
• 125 gr plain flour
• 4 eggs 2 whole + 2 egg yolks
• 2 tbsp dark rum amber rum is traditional

Equipment

saucepan

mixing bowl

whisk

sieve

canelé moulds copper or silicon

baking tray

cooling rack

Instructions

1. Infuse the milk

• Split the vanilla pod lengthways and scrape out the seeds with a knife. Put both the pod and seeds into a saucepan with the milk. Heat until just boiling, then remove from the heat immediately and let it sit for 30 minutes to infuse. The vanilla flavour develops during this time, don't skip it.

2. Mix the batter

• Whilst the milk's infusing, put the flour and sugar in a large bowl and mix them together. Add the whole eggs, egg yolks, and rum, then stir until combined. The mixture will be thick and paste-like at this stage, don't worry, the milk will loosen it up later.

  After the 30-minute infusion, fish the vanilla pod out of the milk with a sieve or spoon. Melt 50g butter in a small pan, then add it to the still-warm vanilla milk and stir it in.

  Now pour the milk and butter mixture into the bowl with your flour, egg, and rum paste. Whisk everything together until you have a smooth batter with no lumps. It'll be quite liquid, thinner than you'd expect for a cake batter, more like thin custard. That's exactly right.

  Cover the bowl with cling film and refrigerate overnight. Minimum 12 hours, but 24 is better. This rest is essential for the texture, so don't try to skip it.

3. Prepare the moulds

• Butter the inside of each mould thoroughly, getting into all the grooves. If you're using copper, be generous with the butter, it helps them release. Arrange the moulds on a baking tray.

4. Bake

• Preheat the oven to 240°C (220°C fan). Give the batter a good stir, it may have separated slightly in the fridge. Fill each mould about two-thirds full. The batter will puff up during baking, then sink back down.

  Bake at 240°C for 10 minutes. This initial blast creates the dark caramelised shell. Reduce the temperature to 180°C (160°C fan) and bake for another 30 minutes. Check them, they should be very dark brown, almost black in places. If they're still pale, give them another 10-15 minutes. The canelés will puff dramatically, then deflate as they cool, which is completely normal.

5. Cool and serve

• Let them cool in the moulds for about 5 minutes, then tip them out onto a cooling rack. They should come out easily, but if one sticks, run a thin knife around the edge.

  Eat them warm or at room temperature. The shell's crispest when they're fresh, after a few hours it softens. Still good, just different.

Notes

• Copper moulds gives you the best caramelisation and most traditional results, but silicon moulds work fine. The canelés won’t be quite as dark, but they’ll still be good.
• Dark or amber rum is traditional. You want the deeper flavour, don’t use white rum.
• This recipe makes standard canelés about 5cm tall. If you’re using different sized moulds (larger or smaller), adjust the baking time. Smaller ones need less time; larger ones need more.
• Oven temperatures vary. If your canelés aren’t dark enough after the full baking time, your oven might run cool. Increase the temperature slightly next time.
• The overnight rest is essential. Don’t try to shortcut it.
• Canelés are best the day they’re made. The shell loses its crispness within a few hours. You can refresh them briefly in a hot oven (about 5 minutes at 180°C), but they’ll never be quite as good as fresh.
• You can freeze the batter for up to a month. Defrost it overnight in the fridge before using.

About this recipe

Canelés de Bordeaux are something I find myself making whenever I have a free afternoon. Years ago, a friend visited Bordeaux and kindly brought some home for me. That first bite, the dark, crisp shell giving way to a soft, custardy middle, was unforgettable. And I can tell you, that dark, crisp shell giving way to a soft, custardy middle is incredibly tasty.

Pinning down the exact origin of the Canelés Bordelais is not easy. The story you hear most often is about 18th‑century nuns at the Couvent des Annonciades. They had all these spare egg yolks from clarifying local wines and turned them into small cakes. Whether this is historical fact or romantic legend is anyone’s guess, but it is a good story and Bordeaux has stuck with it.

How canelés nearly disappeared

After the Revolution shut down the convents, canelés nearly vanished. The nuns who made them were gone, and their recipe went with them. Local pâtissiers brought them back in the early 1900s by piecing together what they could recall from family stories and old notes.

Things really took shape in 1985 when the Confrérie du Canelé de Bordeaux formed to guard the tradition. They settled on the spelling—one “n” in canelé, even if you spot two on some menus or tourist spots. What they watch for boils down to three things: how dark and caramelised the shell is, how soft and custardy the centre remains, and whether the rum and vanilla flavours come through clearly. Every element matters, so officially, you have to nail all three.

The technique

The way you make the canelé de bordeaux has not shifted much in 200 years. Mix a thin batter, then let it rest overnight, that is when the flour drinks up the liquid and the custard magic happens. You should bake in two goes: the first is a blast of high heat to lock in the crisp shell, then a second one, gentler warmth for the tender middle. Mess up the oven and you get either soggy pale things or charred outsides with doughy centres. And there is no shortcuts.

The overnight rest is not optional. Batter mixed and baked the same day produces a different, less developed result. The patience required is part of the canneles bordelais recipe.

The moulds

Those fluted copper moulds are what give the canelés de bordeaux their signature ridges, and they have been the go-to since day one. Copper grabs heat fast, browning the outside dark while the inside stays silky. Traditional bakers slick them with beeswax and butter for that perfect colour and clean pop-out. I stick with De Buyer canelé moulds myself. They are hefty, spread the heat just right like copper does, and churn out that caramelised crust without scorching. The shape is spot-on and once they cool a bit, they slide free. There is no tearing of the shell you worked for. Give them a good seasoning at the start, and they will last you years.

Rum and vanilla

Rum and vanilla hold the whole flavour together. A touch of rum cuts the shell’s sweetness with its warm bite. And the vanilla scents the soft centre so you crave that first crack-through. Both need to be present in the right quantity. Too little rum and the canelés cake taste flat. Too much and the alcohol interferes with the texture. Go for a real vanilla pod, split and scraped into warm milk. It gives you a flavour that extract approximates but never quite matches.

In Bordeaux

In Bordeaux, canelés Bordelais are just part of life. Every pâtisserie has a pile under glass. Grab one with your morning coffee, mid-afternoon, or to cap off dinner. Locals size them up by those same three points the Confrérie does (shell, softness and taste) and they will make sure it’s meeting these standards.