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Dessert

Biscuits, Toad - in - a - Hole

A sweet biscuit made from bitter almond paste and sugar, studded with a dried cherry and sprinkled with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,679 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Biscuits, Toad - in - a - Hole

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.

Prepare the paste

  1. Grind the bitter almonds into a smooth paste, adding water as needed to achieve a thick consistency.

  2. Mix the paste with the white sugar until well combined.

Shape and bake

  1. Line a baking plate with wafer paper.

  2. Shape the mixture into pieces the size of a half-crown coin and place them on the lined baking plate.

  3. Press a dried cherry into the center of each piece and sprinkle sugar over them.

  4. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until done.

  5. Once baked, cut around the wafer paper but do not remove it.

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bitter almonds
Provide the main flavour and form the bulk of the paste.
White sugar
Sweetens the paste and helps bind it into a mixture that holds its shape.
Dried cherries
Add a chewy, fruity centre and contrasting sweetness to each piece.

The step that matters

Grinding the paste to the right consistency. Too much water makes the paste slack so pieces spread in the oven, while too little leaves it crumbly and hard to shape. Adding water gradually keeps the mixture thick enough to hold its form while baking.

“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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