a small shell-shaped cake made of flour, eggs, sugar, and butter and baked in a mold.
something that triggers memories or nostalgia: in allusion to a nostalgic passage in Proust's Remembrance of Things Past.
1835–45; < French, earlier gâteau à la Madeleine, after the female given name; the attribution of the recipe to an 18th-century cook named Madeleine Pau(l)mier is unsubstantiated
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
For him, pinball games unlock memories, much as the madeleine did for Proust.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 15, 2026
Perhaps to people of a certain age who grew up watching it on VHS at slumber parties, it is their madeleine.
From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 18, 2025
They are also kind of the perfect mix between a macaroon and a madeleine.
From Seattle Times • Oct. 3, 2023
Where, for instance, the first recipe for the iconic French madeleine cookie was published in 1758, the chocolate chip cookie was invented nearly two centuries later by Ruth Graves Wakefield in 1938.
From Salon • Jan. 23, 2023
“Wanderlust!” he exclaimed passionately, and then grabbed a petite madeleine as his reward.
From "The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: Book I: The Mysterious Howling" by Maryrose Wood
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
