Name: Chocolate Almonds
Ingredients: Jordan almonds; boiling water; sweet chocolate; vanilla extract or cinnamon; oiled paper

Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Chocolate Almonds

Ingredients

Directions

Blanch the Jordan almonds by pouring boiling water over them and covering for 10 minutes.
Rub the almonds to remove the skins, then dry them with a coarse towel.
Melt sweet chocolate in a bowl over a pan of boiling water.
Flavor the melted chocolate with a few drops of vanilla or a tiny bit of cinnamon.
Use a darning needle or hat pin, cleaned thoroughly, to dip each blanched nut into the melted chocolate.
Lay the coated nuts on a piece of oiled paper to cool and harden.
If desired, re-dip the nuts in chocolate for a thicker coating once the first layer is firm.

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.

Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,961 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,020 recipes

Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).
Almond + chocolatetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,733 recipes

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