Why it works: Sugar and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and 92,116 recipes mention both. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓
Pate Aux Amandes
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the almonds
Take half a pound of sweet almonds and twenty bitter almonds; blanch them, peel, and place in cold water to keep them white. When finished, strain and dry on a napkin, then pound them, adding orange flower water as needed to prevent oiling; keep covered in a napkin.
When all are pounded, if they are too wet or oily, put them on the fire for a minute, adding a handful of sifted sugar; stir constantly, or it will burn.
When the paste is dry enough and does not stick to the stewpan, take it off.
Make the paste
Add the yolks of six eggs and mix with the almonds, adding more sugar if not sweet enough.
Pour the mixture onto a pound of flour on the pasteboard, and mix well with warm milk until a proper consistency.
Add some citron and candied lemon peel according to taste; let the paste stand half an hour.
Roll it out and cut into any shapes you like.
If you wish to make it like puff pastry, use melted butter as in the pâte feuilletée; it will be more delicate and easier to cut into different forms.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Flour and egg share little aroma chemistry, yet 106,462 recipes mention both: they likely 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
- Sweet almonds
- Provide the main body and nutty flavour of the paste when pounded fine.
- Eggs
- Bind the almond mixture and add richness and structure to the paste.
- Flour
- Gives the dough body so it holds its shape when rolled and cut.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the paste and helps it dry out and firm up during gentle heating.
The step that matters
Drying the almond paste on the fire. Stir constantly over low heat, because sugar and almond oils scorch quickly and the paste will burn if left still.
“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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