Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Butter Cookies
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the dough
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.
Gradually add flour, mixing until combined.
Fold in chopped almonds and grated lemon rind.
Shape and bake
Roll dough out thin and cut into desired shapes.
Place on a baking sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes or until lightly golden.
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.
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Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,673 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,655 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
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Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,245 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Butter and flour 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
- Creams with sugar to trap air, giving the cookies a light, tender crumb and rich flavour.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the dough and creams with butter to help create a light, fluffy texture.
- Eggs
- Bind the dough and add moisture and structure as they set during baking.
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the dough that holds the cookie shape when baked.
- Chopped almonds
- Add crunch and nutty flavour, and contribute fat to the dough.
The step that matters
Creaming butter and sugar. Beating butter and sugar until light and fluffy traps air that leavens the dough. Under-creaming yields dense cookies, while over-mixing flour after it is added can make them tough.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, flour, almond):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, flour, almond. 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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