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Dessert

Spice Biscuits, Almond

A spiced biscuit made with treacle, butter, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, coriander, cardamom, candied lemon peel, vanilla, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,536 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Spice Biscuits, Almond

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. Heat the treacle in a saucepan and add the butter.

  2. Stir in the ginger, cinnamon, allspice, coriander, cardamom, candied lemon peel, and vanilla.

  3. Bring the mixture to a boil while stirring continuously.

  4. Remove from heat and let cool.

  5. Once cooled, mix in enough flour to form a stiff paste.

Bake and test

  1. Butter a baking dish and drop spoonfuls of the paste onto it to form small cakes.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until done.

  3. To check if they are done, remove one, let it cool, and ensure it is hard.

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. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + cardamomtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,299 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Coriander + cardamomtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together872 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Ginger + cardamomtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,114 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Treacle
Provides dark sweetness and a sticky body that holds the biscuits together.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the biscuits tenderness and flavour.
Flour
Adds structure, thickening the mixture into a stiff paste that holds its shape.
Powdered ginger
Contributes warm, pungent spice aroma that defines the biscuit's flavour.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before adding flour. Flour added to a hot mixture can cook unevenly and thin or lump the paste, so it should be cool enough to shape into a stiff paste that holds its form while baking.

Swap the vanilla

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, coriander, cardamom, lemon):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Mangofits better
  4. Vanillathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, coriander, cardamom, lemon. 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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