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Dessert

To Make an Almond Posset

A sweet, creamy almond dessert made with milk, cream, almonds, and rose water, served with macaroons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar 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 ↓

To Make an Almond Posset

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the bread

  1. Finely crumble the penny loaf and pour boiling milk over it.

  2. Let it stand for 2-3 hours.

  3. Beat it well.

Make the posset

  1. Add cream, blanched almonds (beaten as fine as possible), and rose water. Mix well.

  2. Set the mixture over low heat and boil for 1 hour.

  3. Allow it to cool.

  4. Beat the yolks of 4 eggs and mix them with the cooled cream.

  5. Sweeten to taste.

Thicken and serve

  1. Stir the mixture over low heat until it thickens, but do not let it boil.

  2. Pour into a China bowl and add 3 macaroons on top before serving.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Almond + rosetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,465 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Cream + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

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

  4. Milk + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,800 recipes

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

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Penny loaf
Soaked in hot milk, its crumb gives the posset body and a soft, thick texture.
Milk
Softens the bread and forms the liquid base that the cream and almonds are mixed into.
Cream
Adds richness and fat, giving the posset a smooth, silky mouthfeel.
Blanched almonds
Ground fine, they add nutty flavour and solids that thicken and texture the mixture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the rich cream and almonds.
Rose water
Adds a floral aroma that flavours the posset.

The step that matters

Stir over low heat until it thickens, without boiling. Egg yolks set gently as they warm. If the mixture boils, the yolks can scramble and curdle, leaving a grainy texture instead of a smooth, thickened custard.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits less well
  4. Walnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, cream, rose, sugar. 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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