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Dessert

Cocoanut Cookies

A sweet cookie made with sugar, lard, butter, coconut, molasses, milk, egg yolks, baking soda, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cocoanut Cookies

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. In a large bowl, cream together the sugar, lard, and butter.

  2. Mix in the macaroon coconut, molasses, milk, and egg yolks until well combined.

  3. Dissolve the baking soda in a small amount of warm water and add to the mixture.

  4. Gradually add the flour until a dough forms.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the dough quite thin on a floured surface.

  2. Cut out cookies using a 3-inch cutter.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Coconut + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,648 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Butter + coconuttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Sugar
Sweetens the dough and helps the cookies brown during baking.
Lard
Adds fat for a tender, crumbly texture.
Butter
Adds fat and flavor, contributing to tenderness and browning.
Macaroon coconut
Adds coconut flavor and moisture to the dough.
Molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and moisture to the cookies.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the dough.

The step that matters

Dissolving the baking soda. Baking soda must be fully dissolved before it is added, so it disperses evenly. Otherwise pockets of it can react unevenly, leaving bitter spots or uneven rising.

Swap the coconut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, molasses, milk, egg, flour):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, molasses, milk, egg, flour. 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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