Pistachio Financiers (Pistachio Almond Cakes)
These pistachio financiers are an absolute delight with their nutty flavor and crisp exterior. They’re sure to become one of your favorite little cakes to enjoy with afternoon tea.
Pistachio Financiers
While pistachio financiers may not be something you’ve heard of before, they’ve definitely been around for ages. Financiers, pronounced fee-nahn-see-ay, are little almond cakes made with beurre noisette (brown butter).
They’re usually baked in small molds, round or rectangular, and they’re sold all over pastry shops in France.
They’re similar to friands, which are also little almond cakes, however friands are typically flavored with fruit and financiers aren’t. Instead, financiers are best flavored with nutty ingredients like pistachios.
Even though the French madeleine is the tea cake that’s most famously heard of around the world, I definitely wouldn’t underestimate the splendor of a financier.
These pistachio financiers, in particular, are an absolute delight. Financiers usually get their nutty flavor from the brown butter that’s used in the batter.
Brown butter is simply just butter that’s melted until it’s brown.
Since the pistachios add enough nuttiness to the batter, you could skip browning your butter here if you wanted.
I bake my pistachio financiers in a mini muffin pan, making them bite-size and perfect for entertaining. I also like the crispy exterior of financiers, and baking them with less batter in each mold will give you those crispier mounds.
Fun additions to this recipe include rose water, cardamom, or even the elusive saffron. Either way, you’re sure to love these irresistible little cakes.
Pistachio Financiers
Delicate little almond cakes flavored with pistachios.
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp unsalted butter, (28 grams) melted (and browned, optional), plus more for greasing pan
- 2 tbsp granulated sugar, (24 grams)
- 2 tbsp brown sugar, (24 grams)
- 1 egg white
- 2 tbsp all-purpose flour, (15 grams)
- 2 tbsp ground pistachios (pistachio flour), (9 grams)
- 1/2 tbsp ground almonds (almond flour/meal), (9 grams)
- 1/4 tsp baking powder, (1 gram)
- tiny pinch of salt
- chopped pistachios, to garnish
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease a mini muffin pan with softened butter. In a medium bowl, whisk the sugars and egg white together until combined.
- Add the flour, ground pistachios, ground almonds, baking powder, and salt. Whisk to combine. Add the melted butter, and again whisk to combine.
- Cover and refrigerate the batter for 1 hour. Then, distribute a heaping teaspoon of batter into each mold. Sprinkle some chopped pistachios on top of each cake.
- Bake the little cakes for about 15 minutes, until golden brown. Let them cool in the pan for about 5 minutes before running a sharp knife along the edges of each cake and gently prying them out.
Notes
If your mini muffin pan isn't nonstick, make sure to flour your pan as well in addition to greasing it with the softened butter. These little cakes can stick!
Nutrition Information:
Yield: 16 Serving Size: 16 ServingsAmount Per Serving: Calories: 38
I only have roasted almonds and roasted and salted pistachios. Would this ruin the recipe?
The switch in nuts won’t ruin the recipe but I would be careful about using salted nuts as that can affect the taste of these! 🙂
Can you make them in advance? As in, how long would they stay fresh in an air tight container? Or, can you freeze them?
Hi Gayle! Yes you can do both! If you put then in an airtight container, they’ll last around 5 days or so like most baked goods. If you freeze them, I usually suggest 3 months for frozen baked goods.
One more question; you said you used a mini-muffin tin. When I looked online there seemed to be two types sold- 24 and 12. Which did you use? Thanks ❤️
Hi Deborah! I use the Williams Sonoma goldtouch 24-cavity mini muffin tin found here. 🙂
Hi! Could you use hazelnut flour and chopped hazelnuts? Would anything else change? I’ve got tons of hazelnuts!!😊
Hi Deborah! You most definitely can! Nothing else in the recipe will change. It will of course be a slightly different flavor as the two nuts are a bit different, but that’s it! Enjoy!! 🙂
Hi,
This recipe is delicious. I made it three times but the third time it got stuck to the muffin pan and it sort of decimated at least half of the muffins. Any tips?
Thank you.
Sincerley,
Elan
Hi Elan! Thanks so much for the kind feedback. My favorite thing to use to get pretty much anything to slip right out of the pan is Pam Baking Spray with Flour. It’s such a life saver, especially for delicate little muffins like these!
I have made these 4 times in the last two weeks…so easy and delicious ! I used orange zest as suggested by Tara (rest of the recipe was the same as original) and it tasted great. Loved both versions. I like that it is the perfect size treat but the difficulty is that it is almost impossible to stop after one !! Thanks Beeta for sharing it. Does it matter what type of brown sugar is used (light brown, dark brown, RAW etc.)?
These were delicious.
I tripled the recipe and made a few adjustments. I used almond flour for both the almond and pistachio meal quantities.
I added freshly grated orange zest and bumped up the salt a bit . 12 min on convection and richly browned, I was glad I hadn’t browned the butter.
Thanks for the comment, Tara! 🙂
Good to eat during snack time or dessert during meal time…
Hi May Ann! It’s definitely a great snack or dessert! Sometimes I do both in one day! 😉