As often happens in the history of food, explanations about the origin of this small cake made of flour, milk, sugar, vanilla, and rum are not always clear. The most widespread version states that the origin of the canelé is related to the small cake that nuns prepared in the 16th century at the Bordeaux convent of the Annonciades.
This cake, called canelat or canelet, was rolled around a cane stem before being fried, hence its name. Another story claims that the canelé gets its name from the canaules, a bread made with flour and egg yolks produced by a craftspeople's guild called canauliers in the 17th century.
It is impossible to know the full history. What is certain is that the word "cannelé" (which is also often written "cannelé", but we'll see why) means "marked with grooves, that is, with ridges and alternating furrows" (definition from Littré), which is specific to this small cake that is baked in a grooved mold.
In 1985, the Confrérie du Cannelé de Bordeaux was created with the goal of promoting this pastry, and it was decided to write canelé with a single 'N' to differentiate it from the word and highlight its specificity to Bordeaux. Today, both spellings, canelés and cannelés de Bordeaux, are accepted.
