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Dessert

Almond Wafers

Almond wafers are thin baked squares of butter, sugar, milk, flour, vanilla, and chopped almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Almond Wafers

Why it works: Vanilla and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Almond Wafers

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. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  2. Slowly add the powdered sugar and milk, drop by drop.

  3. Mix in the pastry flour and vanilla extract until combined.

Bake and shape

  1. Spread the mixture very thinly on the bottom of an inverted, buttered dripping pan.

  2. Mark the spread mixture into squares and sprinkle with chopped almonds.

  3. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about five minutes.

  4. Once baked, place the pan on the back of the range and roll the wafers into tubular or cornucopia shapes.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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 form the base and give the wafers richness and tenderness.
Pastry flour
Provides the structure that holds the thin wafer together after baking.
Powdered sugar
Dissolves easily into the batter, adding sweetness and helping the wafers brown.
Milk
Adds moisture to loosen the batter so it can be spread very thin.

The step that matters

Baking for about five minutes. The wafers are very thin and can go from pale to over-browned quickly, so they need close watch. They must also be shaped while still warm and pliable, before they cool and turn brittle.

“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.

More almond wafers recipes

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