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Dessert

Seegen's Almond-flour Cakes

A cake made from ground blanched almonds, butter, eggs, and a pinch of salt, baked at 300°F.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,245 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Seegen's Almond-flour Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the almond paste

  1. Grind the blanched almonds to a powder in a stone mortar.

  2. Soak the ground almonds in boiling water mixed with vinegar for 15 minutes to remove sugar.

Make the dough and bake

  1. Mix the almond paste with butter, 2 whole eggs, and the yolks of 3 eggs, adding a pinch of salt.

  2. Whip the whites of 3 eggs until stiff and gently fold them into the mixture.

  3. Pour the dough into greased molds and dry in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C).

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 + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Almond + eggtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whites whipped to stiff peaks give the cakes lift and an airy, delicate crumb.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender texture in the dough.
Blanched sweet almonds
Ground into the base of the cakes, providing the main body and nutty flavour.

The step that matters

Folding in the whipped egg whites. Whites hold air only while whipped; stirring them in vigorously knocks the air out and makes the cakes dense. Fold gently so the batter stays light.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Pecansfits better
  2. Almondthe original
  3. Filbertfits about as well
  4. Walnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg. 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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