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Dessert

Almond Coupeaux

A sweet almond paste shaped into an oval, baked until deep yellow.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Almond Coupeaux

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. Blanch and pound the almonds with the egg whites into a fine paste.

  2. Mix in the powdered sugar and grated lemon rind until well combined.

  3. Stir in the orange-flower water to achieve a thin paste.

Shape and bake

  1. Spoon the mixture onto a bright copper plate in an oval shape, about 3-4 inches long.

  2. Gently strike the plate on a table to extend the paste slightly.

  3. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until deep yellow.

Finish and store

  1. Remove from the plate with a knife and shape while hot using a wooden roller.

  2. Allow to cool and store in a dry box.

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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

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

  3. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Sweet almonds
Provide the main body and nutty flavour of the paste.
Egg whites
Bind the ground almonds into a paste and help the coupeaux hold their shape.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the paste brown and set as it bakes.
Orange-flower water
Adds a floral aroma and thins the paste to a workable consistency.
Lemon rind
Adds a bright citrus aroma that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Remove from the plate with a knife and shape while hot. As the baked paste cools, its sugars and proteins harden and it becomes brittle, so it can crack or refuse to bend. Shaping while it is still warm and pliable keeps it from breaking.

“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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