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Dessert

Macaroons

A sweet treat made from almond paste, egg whites, sugar, and orange‑flower water, baked in wafer irons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Macaroons

Why it works: Almond and flour 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 ↓

Macaroons

Ingredients

Directions

Make the paste

  1. Blanch the almonds and pound them with orange-flower water.

  2. Whisk the egg whites to a froth and mix with the almonds and sifted sugar to form a paste.

Shape and make the batter

  1. Lay a sheet of wafer paper on a tin and place small cakes of the mixture on it.

  2. Dust the flour with pounded sugar and mace, then mix with cream to make a thick batter.

Bake

  1. Grease the wafer irons with butter and heat them.

  2. Put a teaspoonful of batter into the hot irons and bake carefully.

  3. Roll the macaroons off the iron with a stick.

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. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  5. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Almonds
Provide the main body and structure of the paste.
Egg whites
Whipped to a froth, they lighten the paste and help it hold its shape.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the paste set and brown as it bakes.
Orange-flower water
Moistens the almonds and adds a floral aroma.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to the batter so it spreads thickly yet smoothly.

The step that matters

Put a teaspoonful of batter into the hot irons and bake carefully.. Heat sets the batter quickly, so the amount and timing matter. Too much batter spreads and burns at the edges, while too little bakes dry and tears when lifted from the iron.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (almond, orange, egg, sugar, flour, cream, butter):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, orange, egg, sugar, flour, cream, butter. 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.

More macaroons recipes

Almond 89Coconut 62Chocolate 43Oatmeal 33Hickory Nut 16Peanut 11 See all 48 →

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