Why it works: Apricot and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,630 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Cannelons, or Fried Puffs
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Prepare puff paste and roll it out very thin.
Cut the paste into pieces about 2 inches wide and 8 inches long.
Fill and seal
Place a spoonful of jam on each piece and wet the edges with egg white.
Fold the paste over twice and press the edges together to seal.
Fry and serve
Fry the prepared cannelons in boiling lard until golden brown.
Let them rest by the fire to ensure the paste is thoroughly cooked.
Drain excess oil, place on a doily, sprinkle with sifted sugar, and serve.
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.
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Apricot + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,630 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Apricot + eggtop 29% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,712 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
- Puff paste
- Flaky layers that puff and crisp when fried in hot fat.
- Apricot jam
- Sweet filling that becomes sticky and fragrant as it heats inside the pastry.
- Lard
- Hot frying fat that cooks the pastry quickly and gives it a golden, crisp surface.
- Egg white
- Acts as a glue that seals the edges so the filling stays inside while frying.
The step that matters
Sealing the edges. If the egg-white-wet edges are not pressed firmly shut, the filling can leak into the hot lard, causing splattering and an open, unevenly cooked pastry.
Swap the apricot
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Raisinfits better
- Lemonfits better
- Apricotthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against 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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