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Dessert

Pecan Macaroons

A sweet treat made with pecans, brown sugar, egg whites, and cinnamon, baked into small cookies.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Pecans and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,047 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Pecan Macaroons

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a cool oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a bowl, whip the egg whites until frothy.

Make the mixture

  1. Add the brown sugar and chopped pecans to the whipped egg whites, then mix in a pinch of cinnamon.

  2. If using large eggs, add more pecans.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto parchment paper.

  2. Bake in the preheated oven for nearly 2 hours.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pecans + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Pecans + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,280 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Pecans + sugartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped into foam, they trap air and set in the oven to give the macaroons their light structure.
Pecans
Add bulk, crunch and rich nutty fat that contrasts with the soft, chewy interior.
Light brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the mixture brown and turn chewy as it bakes.

The step that matters

Baking at a low temperature for a long time. Egg white proteins set and the mixture slowly dries at a low oven heat. Too much heat browns the outside before the centre sets, so keep the oven at the stated 300°F and bake for the full time.

Swap the pecans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, cinnamon):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Chestnutfits about as well
  3. Pecansthe original
  4. Pistachiofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, cinnamon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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