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Dessert

Nut Cheese

A spread made from chopped nuts, dried fruit, and raisins, packed into jars for use as a sandwich filling or meat alternative.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and pine match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 176 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Nut Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the almonds, filberts, peanuts, pecans, and pine nuts.

  2. Add the chopped raisins, figs, and dates.

Shape and store

  1. Knead the mixture until well combined.

  2. Pack the mixture into glass jars.

Serve

  1. Use as a sandwich filling.

  2. Slice and serve as a meat alternative.

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 + pinetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together176 recipes

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

  2. Almond + raisintop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Almond + figtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Almond + peanuttop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together305 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetylpyrazine (roast).

  5. Peanut + nutstop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together81 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Almonds
Provide crunch and body, giving the mixture a firm, chewy-crisp texture.
Filberts
Add fat and richness, contributing a buttery flavour and firm bite.
Pecans
Add fat and a mellow, toasty flavour to the nut base.
Pine nuts
Add soft fat and a delicate sweetness that helps bind the mixture.
Dates
Add sweetness and moisture, helping the mixture hold together when kneaded.
Figs
Add sweetness and moisture, helping the mixture hold together when kneaded.

The step that matters

Knead the mixture until well combined. Kneading spreads the moist dried fruit evenly through the chopped nuts. Uneven mixing leaves dry pockets that crumble and wet pockets that turn sticky, so the slice will not hold together.

Swap the filbert

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (almond, peanut, pecans, pine, nuts, raisin, fig):

  1. Pistachiofits better
  2. Brazil nutfits better
  3. Walnutfits better
  4. Filbertthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, peanut, pecans, pine, nuts, raisin, fig. 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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