Skip to main content
Dessert

Vacherin for Sweet Creams

A sweet almond paste shell filled with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Vacherin for Sweet Creams

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.

Prepare the paste

  1. Blanch, peel, and pound the almonds.

  2. Mix the almonds with the sugar and moisten to a stiff paste with the egg white.

  3. Dust a pastry board with powdered sugar and roll the almond paste to ¼ inch thick.

Shape the case

  1. Line a 6‑inch diameter plain mold with a band of paste 1½ inches deep, sealing the ends with egg white.

  2. Cut a round of paste slightly larger than the bottom of the mold.

  3. Bake both in a gentle oven at 300°F (150°C) until dry.

  4. Remove from the oven, detach the band from the mold, and attach it to the round.

  5. Return to the oven until slightly colored, then cool completely.

Fill and serve

  1. Fill the case with whipped cream, piling it high.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Almond + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

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

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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 bulk and nutty flavor of the paste that forms the crisp case.
White sugar
Sweetens the paste and helps it dry to a crisp, firm texture when baked.
Egg white
Binds the almonds and sugar into a stiff paste and seals the joins of the case.

The step that matters

Baking the case until dry. The paste must dry fully in a gentle oven so the case stays crisp and holds its shape under the cream. Too hot an oven can brown or puff it before it is dried through.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits less well
  4. Pecansfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, cream. 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.

You might also like

Almond Sponge CakeAlmond Sponge Cake26 recipesAlmond CustardAlmond Custard22 recipesAlmond WafersAlmond Wafers22 recipesCoconut Almond CakeCoconut Almond Cake17 recipes