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Almond Wafers

A baked almond and sugar wafer cut into strips and twisted around wood.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Almond Wafers

Why it works: Almond and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Almond Wafers

Oven, in the book's wordsA gentle oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a gentle oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Chop the almonds into small pieces.

  2. Beat the eggs together, then add to the chopped almonds.

  3. Sift in the flour and add the powdered sugar; flavor as desired.

  4. Grease a stout baking tin with butter.

Bake and shape

  1. Spread the almond mixture thinly in the tin.

  2. Bake in a gentle oven at 300°F (150°C) until golden.

  3. Remove from the oven and cut into strips 4 inches long and 2 inches wide.

  4. Roll or twist the strips around a round piece of wood to create a hollow shape.

  5. Optionally, place a large strawberry in each end.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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 bulk and nutty flavor that make up the wafer's body.
Eggs
Bind the chopped almonds together into a mixture that holds its shape.
Flour
Adds a small amount of structure so the thin mixture holds together when cut and shaped.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the wafers brown and turn golden in the oven.

The step that matters

Spreading the mixture thinly. A thin layer bakes evenly and crisps through, while a thick layer stays soft in the middle and becomes hard to cut and shape into strips.

“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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