Start by melting the butter either in a pan or the microwave then let cool.

In a bowl, mix together the sugar with the eggs. Sift in the flour and baking soda, the milk and combine with the egg mixture. Add the melted butter and the vanilla extra/beans and mix. Cover and put in the fridge for at least 2 hours, ideally overnight.

When you are ready to cook them, preheat at 450F.

Take some butter and grease the madeleines pan, then dust with flour, swirl to make sure there is flour covering all the butter. Reverse the pan and give it a gentle tap to remove excess flour.

Either pipe the dough in the mould, use an ice cream scoop or use 2 spoons to form a ball shape to drop in each cavity. You don’t want to overfill them as they will puff, 1tbsp should do the job.

Cook for 2 minutes then turn off the oven but let them bake for another 5 minutes. The key to know when they are ready is to look at the side of the madeleine. When they start to brown, they are done.

Optionally, dust with some icing sugar and enjoy while still a bit warm