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Dessert

Pistachio Macaroons

A sweet treat made from pistachios, Jordan almonds, egg white, powdered sugar, Curacao, and spinach juice, baked into firm balls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pistachio and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 693 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Pistachio Macaroons

Oven, in the book's wordsA gentle oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a gentle oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the paste

  1. Blanch the pistachios and Jordan almonds, then pound them in a mortar to a smooth paste, adding the egg white a few drops at a time.

  2. Mix in the powdered sugar, Curacao, and spinach juice for coloring until you have a smooth but firm paste.

Shape and bake

  1. Form the mixture into balls nearly 1 inch in diameter and place them on a baking sheet, leaving space between each.

  2. Bake in a gentle oven at 300°F (150°C) until hard and set, about 20 minutes.

  3. Turn the macaroons upside down and brush the back of the baking sheet with a little water to help lift them off.

Store

  1. Store in a cool, dry place until needed.

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. Pistachio + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together693 recipes

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

  2. Pistachio + spinachtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together110 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Almond + spinachtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together352 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

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

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Pistachios
Provide the main nutty flavour and the bulk of the paste.
Jordan almonds
Add body and almond flavour to the paste.
Egg white
Binds the ground nuts into a paste that holds its shape.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the paste and helps it firm up as it bakes.

The step that matters

Baking until hard and set. Gentle oven heat dries the paste slowly so the macaroons set through without browning or cracking. Pulling them too early leaves them soft and sticky, while overbaking makes them dry and brittle.

Swap the spinach

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

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Beetrootfits about as well
  3. Spinachthe original
  4. Sweet potatofits about as well

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