How to make Palets Bretons – salt butter biscuits from Brittany?

Level: Easy
Total Time: 1h 30min

These small wonders from Brittany called Palets Bretons are just so good! They are perfect with tea, but the kids also love them with a glass of cold milk. Palets Bretons are said to have been created in 1670 when they were offered to King Louis XIV by the Marquise de Sablé de Souvre. Their shape and name “Palet” or puck came from a local game with puck-shaped metallic elements. Today you will find these biscuits in industrial versions in any supermarket, but the recipe is also used as a base for numerous tart varieties in France.

All you need for this recipe is egg yolks, flour, sugar, baking powder, vanilla, and of course the butter. And the butter should be salted! The salt and sugar taste is what makes these biscuits so particular. In France, there are three different levels of salt in butter. The first category is “Doux” or soft, standard butter with no added salt, the second category is “Demie sel” or lightly salted with 0,5-3% salt, and the third category is “Salé” or salted butter with more than 3% of salt. In this recipe, you should use lightly salted butter.

THE TIPS TO SUCCEED

1: Make sure you use lightly salted butter for this recipe. If you only have unsalted butter, you can add 4-5g (or a small teaspoon) of good sea salt.

2: You need to bake the biscuits in the cookie cutters to keep the shape and for the biscuits to rise rather than floating out. But that is only a question of shape, the taste is the same! 🙂

Let’s get started

Ingredients

Makes 20 biscuits

• 5 pcs Egg yolks (you can make French financier with the egg white leftovers)
• 150/5,3 g/oz Sugar
• 1 tsp Vanilla extract
• 230/8,1 g/oz All-purpose flour
• 1 tsp Baking powder
• 180/6,3 g/oz Lightly salted butter 0,5-3% salt

How to do it?

The butter needs to be soft (room temperature) but not melted.

Mix the egg yolks and sugar by hand until the mixture becomes airy.

Add the vanilla extract and mix.

Add the butter, sifted flour and baking powder, and mix quickly (either with your hands or a wooden spoon).

Put the dough on the table and use a silicone pastry scraper to press the dough towards the table, little by little. Do this twice. This avoids remaining lumps of butter in the dough.

Place the dough in between two sheets of baking paper and roll the dough until 1cm thick.

Leave the dough flat on a baking tray in the freezer for 30min – 1h, or until it is firm enough to easily cut out cookies. You can alternatively leave it for a couple of hours in the fridge.

Preheat the oven at 180°c or 350°F.

Place the cookies in the cookie cutter on a baking paper-covered baking tray. If you cook them without the cookie cutters, make sure you leave some space between them as they will float out.

Bake for approx 15min or until golden brown. Leave them to cool down on a grid.

How do I serve the Palets Bretons?

These are excellent with tea or a glass of cold milk, but also excellent as a base for desserts or cakes. An easy dessert version is crumbled Palets Bretons in a dessert glass topped with lemon cream or mousse.