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Dessert

Chocolats Macaroons

Chocolate macaroons made from melted chocolate, powdered sugar, egg whites, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Chocolate and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,404 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chocolats Macaroons

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.

Make the paste

  1. Melt the chocolate in a pan over low heat.

  2. Mix in the powdered sugar and egg whites to form a thick paste.

Shape the cookies

  1. Roll the mixture to about 1/4 inch thick.

  2. Cut out small, round pieces with a cookie cutter.

Bake

  1. Grease a baking pan.

  2. Dust the pan with flour and sugar.

  3. Place the pieces on the pan.

  4. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until set.

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. Chocolate + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Chocolate + flourtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,994 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Egg and flour 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

Plain chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavor and fat that gives the macaroons their rich body.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the cookies and, with the egg whites, forms the thick paste that holds their shape.
Egg whites
Bind the sugar and chocolate into a paste and set during baking to give the cookies structure.

The step that matters

Mix in the powdered sugar and egg whites to form a thick paste.. The paste must be thick enough to roll and cut cleanly. If it is too wet, the pieces will spread in the oven and lose their shape.

“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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