Name: Wafer Chocolates
Ingredients: 2 pounds almond paste; 1 ounce ground bitter almonds; 2 pounds cold dipping cream; XXXX sugar (for dusting and mixing); finely chopped almonds (for mixing into chocolate)

Why it works: Almond and chocolate are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,733 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Wafer Chocolates

Ingredients

2 pounds almond paste
1 ounce ground bitter almonds
2 pounds cold dipping cream
XXXX sugar (for dusting and mixing)
finely chopped almonds (for mixing into chocolate)

Directions

Dust a slab thickly with XXXX sugar.
Pour the almond paste mixture onto the slab and let it cool.
Flavor the mixture with pistachio and work in enough XXXX sugar to form a stiff dough.
Roll out the dough to the thickness of mint wafers.
Cut out 1-inch rounds using a lozenge cutter and let them set until hard enough to handle.
Prepare your chocolate for dipping.
As you pour the chocolate into a pan or onto the slab, mix in a little finely chopped almonds.
Dip the wafers into the chocolate.

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.

Almond + chocolatetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,733 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Cream + chocolatetop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,466 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,404 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Almond + creamtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,130 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).