Raspberry Friands

Another friand variety, every couple of weeks I change the flavour to reflect the change of seasons and keep customers coming back for something different. I'm going to repeat myself and recommend you buy flaked almonds and ground them in a food processor this will give the friands a better crumb and infinitely lighter. You can use pre-ground almonds but I find the final product too dry, dense and smacky on the pallet. Also this mixture will sit happily in your fridge for up to a week and yields around 48 friands.

600g flaked almonds
300g caster sugar
250g good quality salted butter
100ml buttermilk
10 egg whites
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
150g raspberries

ICING:
200g raspberries
400g cream cheese
100g caster sugar
1 teaspoon lemon juice

METHOD:
Place butter in a small sauce pan and melt over medium heat till it becomes foamy then remove from heat and leave to stand. Ground almonds in food processor till fine like bread crumbs might take several minutes to get the right consistency. Then place almonds in a large mixing bowl with sugar, baking powder, soda, cinnamon and mix together till combined. Add the buttermilk, egg whites, vanilla, butter to the dry mixture and beat together for 2 minutes.
To bake friands grease friand pan with either oil spray or butter and 3/4 fill each mold then dot 3 raspberries down each friand like buttons. Bake in a pre-heated oven set at 180oC for 25 minutes.
To make the icing place raspberries, sugar and lemon juice in sauce pan and place over a medium heat, cook for about 10 minutes till a syrup forms then remove from heat and leave to cool till luke warm. Put cream cheese in mixing bowl and using a beater whip air into cream cheese. Pour half the raspberry syrup into cream cheese and beat till well combined. Using a tablespoon place a large dot of icing on top of each friand followed by 1 teaspoon of raspberry syrup and a fresh raspberry then lightly dust with icing sugar.