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Bread

Christmas Cookies

Cookies made with flour, butter, sugar, egg yolks, eggs, brandy, almonds, baking powder, topped with almonds, sugar, cinnamon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,514 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Christmas Cookies

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Mash the egg yolks until smooth.

  2. Add sugar and butter, then cream together.

  3. Beat in the two whole eggs and brandy.

  4. Mix in flour and baking powder, then half of the chopped almonds.

  5. Toss part of the dough on a floured board and roll out thin.

Shape and bake

  1. Cut into shapes and place on buttered baking sheets.

  2. Brush with beaten egg and sprinkle with remaining almonds mixed with sugar and cinnamon.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until light pink.

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. Almond + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the dough together as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness, and helps the dough cream together.
Sugar
Sweetens the dough and contributes to browning on the surface.
Egg yolks
Add richness and binding, giving the dough a tender, cohesive texture.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure and moisture to the cookies.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cookies rise and lighten.

The step that matters

Rolling the dough thin. Thin dough bakes evenly and crisps, while thick dough stays cakey in the centre. Keep the dough cool and lightly floured so it does not stick or toughen from extra flour.

“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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