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Orgeat for Present Use

A sweet almond syrup made with sweet and bitter almonds, water, milk, lemon rind, orange flower water, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Orgeat for Present Use

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the almonds

  1. Blanch the sweet and bitter almonds.

  2. Pound the blanched almonds finely in a mortar.

Make the orgeat

  1. Gradually add the water, milk, and grated lemon rind, mixing well.

  2. Let the mixture steep for 30 minutes.

  3. Strain the mixture through a fine napkin, squeezing out all the liquid.

  4. Add the orange flower water and enough sugar to sweeten.

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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

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

  3. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Sweet almonds
Provide the main nutty body and creamy texture of the drink.
Bitter almonds
Add a deeper, sharper almond aroma that balances the sweetness.
Milk
Adds richness and fat, giving the orgeat a smooth, creamy body.
Orange flower water
Contributes a floral aroma that defines the character of the drink.

The step that matters

Pound the blanched almonds finely. Fine pounding breaks the almond cells so more flavour and oil are released into the liquid. Coarse pieces leave the orgeat gritty and weak in flavour, and straining cannot fully remove them.

“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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