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Cinnamon Almonds

A sweet treat of almonds coated with sugar and cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,514 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Cinnamon Almonds

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Layer 2 ounces of almonds in a pan.

  2. Sprinkle with fine sugar.

  3. Repeat layering with gum Senegal and cinnamon every fourth layer.

  4. Continue until all ingredients are used.

  5. Finish with a final layer of sugar for gloss.

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
Form the bulk of the coating and give the finished piece its crunchy core.
Fine sugar
Forms a sweet, crisp, glossy shell over the almonds as it is layered and finished.
Gum senegal
Acts as a binder so the sugar and cinnamon adhere evenly to the almonds.
Pulverized cinnamon
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavor to the sugar coating.

The step that matters

Layering the gum Senegal and cinnamon. Gum Senegal is a binder that helps the sugar and cinnamon stick to the nuts. Spreading it evenly across the layers keeps the coating uniform instead of clumped or patchy.

“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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