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Dessert

Nuns' Biscuits

A sweet almond biscuit with lemon zest, candied citron, and egg whites, baked until browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and lemon 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 ↓

Nuns' Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the almond paste

  1. Blanch the sweet and bitter almonds, then pound them in a mortar to a smooth paste, adding a little orange-flower water to prevent oiling.

  2. Grate the lemon zest into the loaf sugar, crush it to powder, sift well, and mix with the almond paste.

Make the batter

  1. Add the dried flour, minced candied citron, beaten egg yolks, and finally fold in the whisked egg whites.

  2. Grease small patty pans with butter and fill them with a spoonful or two of the mixture.

Bake and harden

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until brightly browned, about 20 minutes.

  2. Turn the biscuits out onto baking tins and return to the oven to harden.

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. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  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

Sweet almonds
Provide the main body and nutty flavour of the paste.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the batter together.
Egg whites
Whisked to a firm froth, they lighten the batter and help it rise.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the biscuits and contributes to browning in the oven.
Dried flour
Adds light structure so the biscuits hold their shape when baked.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whisked whites hold air that gives lift; stirring them vigorously deflates the foam and leaves dense, flat biscuits. Fold gently so the batter keeps its volume.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, lemon, sugar, flour, egg, 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.

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