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Dessert

Orange-nut Bars

A baked bar made with flour, nuts, eggs, vanilla, and orange pieces.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,371 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Orange-nut Bars

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut orange slices into small pieces using scissors dipped in cold water.

  2. In a bowl, combine flour and salt, then add the orange pieces.

  3. Add the chopped nuts, beaten eggs, and vanilla, and mix well.

Bake and serve

  1. Spread the mixture evenly in two greased 9x9x2 inch pans.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 45 minutes.

  3. Cool in the pans before cutting into bars.

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. Vanilla + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,371 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Nuts + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together638 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + nutstop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Eggs
Bind the batter and set into a firm, sliceable crumb as they bake.
Flour
Forms the structure that holds the bars together after baking.
Chopped nuts
Add texture and body, giving the bars a bite against the soft crumb.
Orange slices
Add moisture and a bright citrus aroma and flavour throughout the bars.

The step that matters

Cut orange slices into small pieces with scissors dipped in cold water. Orange pieces are sticky and their sugars and oils make them cling to blades. Cold water keeps the scissors clean and stops the pieces from smearing, so they stay distinct in the batter.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, nuts, egg, vanilla):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, nuts, egg, vanilla. 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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