Skip to main content
Dessert

To Make Mush

A sweet almond pastry baked from a batter of flour, sugar, eggs, butter, and almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Randolph · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and 8,450 recipes mention both. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

To Make Mush

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Put a lump of butter the size of an egg into a quart of water, add corn meal and a little salt, and stir constantly until smooth.

  2. Combine one pound of fine sugar with two pounds of flour, add pounded spice of any kind, and sift the mixture.

  3. Beat four eggs, pour them into the mixture with three quarters of a pound of melted butter, knead well, and bake.

  4. Blanch a pound of sweet almonds and pound them in a mortar with rose water.

Make the macaroon and bake

  1. Whip the whites of seven eggs to a strong froth, add one pound of powdered sugar, and beat for some time.

  2. Fold the almonds into the egg-sugar mixture, mix well, drop onto sheets of paper buttered, sift sugar over, and bake quickly, being careful not to let them discolor.

By Mary Randolph. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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.

  1. Flour + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together8,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together9,198 recipes

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

  3. Flour + buttertop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together122,858 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together118,511 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Flour + eggtop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together104,138 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter share little aroma chemistry, yet 122,858 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 flavour and the bulk of the macaroon's texture when pounded fine.
Eggs
Whipped whites form a foam that gives the macaroons lightness and structure.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the whipped egg whites and helps stabilise the foam.
Flour
Provides structure to the dough so it holds its shape while baking.
Melted butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.

The step that matters

Baking the macaroons quickly. Sugar and almonds brown readily, so a hot, short bake keeps the macaroons pale and prevents them from discolouring or drying out before they set.

“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.

You might also like

Almond Sponge CakeAlmond Sponge Cake26 recipesAlmond CustardAlmond Custard22 recipesAlmond WafersAlmond Wafers22 recipesCoconut Almond CakeCoconut Almond Cake17 recipes