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Drink

Milk of Almonds

A sweet almond milk beverage made by blending blanched almonds, milk, sugar, and orange‑flower water, then boiling and straining.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,125 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Milk of Almonds

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the almonds

  1. Blanch the almonds.

  2. Pound them in a marble mortar until they form a very fine paste.

  3. Add drops of milk to prevent them from turning to oil.

  4. Dilute the almond paste with milk.

  5. Squeeze the mixture through a linen cloth.

Cook and finish

  1. Put the mixture on the fire.

  2. Boil until it reduces by half.

  3. Add the sugar and orange-flower water.

  4. Bring to a single boil.

  5. Strain through a fine sieve.

  6. Serve in a vase or china bowl.

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 + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

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

  2. Milk + orangetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,696 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Almond + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,800 recipes

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

  4. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Almonds
Provide the main body and nutty flavour of the milk once ground into a paste.
Milk
Loosens the almond paste into a smooth liquid and adds creaminess.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the reduced liquid body.
Orange-flower water
Adds a floral aroma that flavours the finished milk.

The step that matters

Pound the almonds to a very fine paste. Almonds release oil when worked too hard or too dry, which makes the drink greasy and gritty. Adding milk drop by drop keeps the paste emulsified and smooth.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (almond, milk, sugar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, milk, sugar. 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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