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Dessert

Fig Sandwiches

A sweet sandwich made with a fig paste spread between lady-fingers or cakelets.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Fig and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 519 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Fig Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. In a saucepan, combine the chopped figs and water. Cook until it forms a smooth paste.

  2. Mix in the chopped almonds, rose-water, and lemon juice. Allow to cool.

Assemble and serve

  1. Spread the fig mixture on lady-fingers or cakelets.

  2. Top with another lady-finger or cakelet and serve on a doily-covered plate.

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. Fig + almondtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Almond + rosetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,465 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Fig + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together763 recipes

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

  5. Rose + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,174 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Figs
Cook down into a smooth paste that forms the sweet, sticky filling.
Blanched almonds
Add body and a nutty texture that thickens the filling once pounded.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness of the figs.
Lady-fingers or cakelets
Provide the dry, sponge-like layers that hold the fig filling.

The step that matters

Cooking the figs to a smooth paste. Figs must be cooked until broken down and thick; if they stay in chunks, the filling will not spread evenly or hold between the cakes. Letting the mixture cool before spreading lets it firm up so it does not soak into the lady-fingers.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fig, almond, rose):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Orangefits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, almond, rose. 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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