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Dessert

Petits Fours

Small pastries made with candied lemon, blanched almonds, powdered sugar, eggs, flour, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Petits Fours

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. In a large bowl, crack the eggs and whisk them like an omelette.

  2. Add the powdered sugar, almonds, and spices, mixing well for 40 minutes.

  3. Gradually add flour until the mixture is firm enough to roll out.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough and cut it into squares measuring 2 inches by 4.5 inches.

  2. Bake on lightly floured sheets.

Glaze

  1. Glaze with cooked sugar using a brush, similar to icing.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Almond + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 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

Eggs
Whisked eggs provide structure and moisture, binding the dough and helping it rise slightly.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness and bulk, helping give the dough body and a fine crumb.
Blanched almonds
Add texture and body to the dough, and their fat adds richness.
Flour
Gives the dough enough firmness to roll out and hold its cut shape.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until the mixture is firm enough to roll out. Adding flour too quickly can make the dough stiff and dry, while too little leaves it sticky and hard to shape. Adding it gradually lets you stop once the dough holds together and rolls cleanly.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, sugar, egg, flour, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg. 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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