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Dessert

Orange Wafers

Orange wafers made with orange juice, molasses, sugar, flour, sour milk, soda, butter, cinnamon, and candied orange peel.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Martin, Maria Ewing, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Orange Wafers

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. Mix 1 cup butter, 1 cup sugar, yolks of 2 eggs, 1 tablespoon orange juice, grated peel of 1 orange, 1 scant cup flour, and 1 teaspoon baking powder.

  2. Chill the mixture, mix well, roll very thin, place a piece of candied orange peel on top of each wafer, and bake in a quick oven.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in shallow pans and serve hot.

  2. Dissolve the soda in hot water, but if sweet milk is used, take baking powder instead.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

959Calories
29 gProtein
26 gFat
152 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 8 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Sour Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Orange1 medium (131g)62
Molasses1 tbsp (20g)58
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Cinnamon1 tsp ground (2.6g)6

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Martin, Maria Ewing, Mrs., [from old catalog] comp. 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. See the original page.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Orange + teatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together333 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Milk + teatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together738 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Butter
Adds fat that makes the wafers rich and tender as they bake.
Eggs
Yolks add richness and help bind the dough so it holds together when rolled.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the thin wafers together.
Sugar
Sweetens the wafers and helps them brown as they bake.

The step that matters

Rolling the dough very thin. Thin dough bakes quickly and crisps evenly, while thick dough stays soft and may not set properly in a quick oven.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, sugar, flour, milk, egg, tea, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, flour, milk, egg, tea, butter. 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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