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Dessert

Almond Nougat

A sweet confection made from honey, egg whites, sugar, nuts, and baked into a hard nougat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Almond Nougat

Ingredients

Directions

Make the nougat base

  1. Combine honey and egg whites in a copper basin and beat until foamy.

  2. Place the basin over a gentle fire, cover with ashes, and stir continuously for 2 hours.

  3. Cook sugar with cream of tartar until it reaches 290°F (hard crack stage).

  4. While stirring the egg mixture, slowly pour in the hot syrup.

  5. Mix in the dried nuts until well combined.

Set and finish

  1. Pour the mixture into a starch tray lined with ordinary paper and then wafer paper.

  2. Spread evenly with a palette knife and cover with wafer paper.

  3. Let cool for 10 to 12 hours.

  4. Once cooled, cut into 3-4 inch pieces and wrap in wax paper.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Honey + pistachiotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together130 recipes

    Shared aroma: pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Cream + pistachiotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together634 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  4. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + pistachiotop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,233 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Honey
Provides sweetness and a chewy, moist body that keeps the nougat soft.
Whites of 24 eggs
Beaten into foam to create the airy structure that gives nougat its light texture.
Sugar
Cooks to a hard crack syrup that sets firm as the nougat cools.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the sugar syrup, helping prevent crystallisation for a smoother texture.
Pistachio nuts or blanched almonds
Add crunch and nutty flavour throughout the set nougat.

The step that matters

Pouring the hot syrup into the egg whites. The syrup must be added slowly while stirring constantly. Pouring too fast can cook the egg whites unevenly or deflate the foam, weakening the structure that holds the nougat together.

Swap the pistachio

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

  1. Almondfits about as well
  2. Pistachiothe original
  3. Walnutfits about as well
  4. Pecansfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against honey, egg, sugar, cream. 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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