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Dessert

Bitter Macaroons

A sweet treat made from bitter almonds, sugar, and egg whites, formed into small lumps and baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,679 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Bitter Macaroons

Oven, in the book's wordsA slack oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the paste

  1. Blanch and dry the almonds, then pound them in a mortar with the egg whites gradually to prevent oil separation.

  2. Once the almonds are finely pounded, mix in the sifted sugar and 6 or 7 egg whites, adjusting based on the paste's consistency.

Shape and bake

  1. Wet your fingers with water to prevent sticking, then drop the mixture in small lumps onto a baking sheet.

  2. Dip your hand in cold water and lightly touch the tops of the macaroons to make them shine.

  3. Bake in a slow oven; test the heat by placing one or two macaroons in first.

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 + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  3. Almond + eggtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,645 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bitter almonds
Provide the main flavour and the bulk of the paste.
Sugar
Sweetens the macaroons and helps give them body and structure.
Egg whites
Bind the almond paste and give the macaroons their light, set structure.

The step that matters

Adding the egg whites gradually while pounding the almonds. Almonds release oil when crushed, and adding liquid slowly keeps the paste emulsified so the oil does not separate. Adding too much white at once can make the paste loose and greasy, so the macaroons spread and lose shape.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Pecansfits about as well
  2. Almondthe original
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Milletfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. 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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