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Dessert

Macarons

Macarons are almond-based pastries made with powdered sugar, egg whites, and optional flavorings, baked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,514 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Macarons

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the paste

  1. Grind the almonds finely.

  2. Mix the ground almonds with sugar.

  3. Add orange blossom water or egg whites gradually to prevent the mixture from becoming oily.

  4. Incorporate 3-4 egg whites slowly to form a paste.

Pipe and bake

  1. Transfer the mixture to a piping bag fitted with a nozzle.

  2. Pipe the macarons onto parchment paper, spaced apart.

  3. Dust with powdered sugar and bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.

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. Almond + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Vanilla + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  4. Orange + cinnamontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Almonds
Provide the main body and nutty flavour of the cookie shell.
Sugar
Sweetens the shell and helps it dry to a crisp, set surface.
Egg whites
Supply moisture and structure, binding the almond and sugar into a pipeable paste.

The step that matters

Adding the liquid gradually. Adding liquid slowly keeps the almond and sugar mixture from becoming oily or separating, so the paste stays smooth and holds its shape when piped.

Swap the orange

The recipe marks orange as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (almond, sugar, egg, lemon, vanilla, cinnamon):

  1. Blueberryfits about as well
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Orangethe original
  4. Raisinfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, sugar, egg, lemon, vanilla, 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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