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Dessert

Almond Jumbles

A sweet almond-based pastry made with sugar, butter, almonds, eggs, and flour, baked until golden and optionally brushed with sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Almond Jumbles

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter.

  3. Add the chopped almonds and eggs, mixing well.

  4. Gradually add flour until the mixture is stiff.

  5. Roll the dough thin and cut into desired shapes.

Finish and bake

  1. Moisten the tops with egg white.

  2. Sprinkle with sugar.

  3. Bake in the preheated oven until lightly golden.

  4. If desired, brush the tops with sherry wine.

  5. If desired, return to the oven briefly to dry.

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 + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Almond + sherrytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together517 recipes

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

  5. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Sugar
Sweetens the dough and helps the cookies brown and crisp as they bake.
Butter
Adds fat for a rich, tender texture and carries flavour through the dough.
Blanched and chopped almonds
Provide the main nutty flavour and body, giving the dough its texture.
Eggs
Bind the dough together and add moisture and structure.
Flour
Gives the dough enough structure to hold its shape when rolled and cut.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until the mixture is stiff. Too little flour leaves the dough too soft to roll and cut cleanly, while too much makes the jumbles dry and tough. Adding it gradually lets you stop once the dough holds its shape.

“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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