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Macaroon Slices

Sliced almond macaroons baked on sweet pastry dough and topped with chopped almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Macaroon Slices

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Spread the almond paste, sugar, egg whites, and flour mixture on a thin sheet of sweet pastry dough, ½ inch thick.

  2. Strew chopped almonds on top.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.

  2. Allow to cool, then cut into penny oblongs.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

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

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

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Almond paste
Adds sweetness, nutty flavor, and moisture to the filling.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps the top brown as it bakes.
Egg whites
Set on heating to give the filling a firm, cohesive structure.
Flour
Adds structure that helps the filling hold its shape when baked.
Chopped almonds
Make a crunchy, textured topping on the baked slices.
Sweet pastry dough
Forms a base that holds the filling while it bakes.

The step that matters

Bake until set. Egg whites and flour firm up as they heat, so the filling needs to bake until it no longer wobbles. Underbaking leaves it wet and sticky, while overbaking dries it and makes it tough.

“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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