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Dessert

Imitation Almonds

A confection made from sugar, almond pulp, and preserve, shaped and colored to resemble almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Imitation Almonds

Ingredients

Directions

Make the paste

  1. Boil the sugar until it reaches the crack stage.

  2. Incorporate the pounded almonds into the sugar.

  3. Dry the mixture over low heat to form a paste.

Shape the almonds

  1. Shape the paste into halves of almonds, slightly hollowed on the inner side.

  2. Fill the hollow part with stiff preserve.

  3. Stick two halves together to form a whole almond.

  4. Color part of the paste green.

  5. Envelop the almond to resemble a green almond.

Dry and finish

  1. Dust the imitation almonds with sifted sugar.

  2. Place them on wire trays 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 + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and orange barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
Forms the structure of the paste when boiled to the crack stage and sets firm as it cools.
Scalded almonds
Provide the main almond flavor and the body of the paste.
Stiff preserve
Adds a fruity, moist filling inside the hollowed halves.
Essence of bitter almonds
Adds a concentrated almond aroma to the paste.

The step that matters

Boiling the sugar to the crack stage. Sugar boiled to the crack stage sets firm when cooled, so the paste holds its shape. Boiled too little, the paste stays sticky; boiled too long, it turns hard and brittle.

Swap the orange

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, almond. 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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