A hefty pastry cook, his bulk encased in a white overall, stares at the camera, full of professional pride as he wields his whisk in a giant copper bowl.

The cook patted down some lumps in the pastry.

Some sources say madeleines may have been named for a 19th century pastry cook, Madeleine, but other sources have it that Madeleine was a cook in the 18th century for Stanislaw Leszczynski.