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Dessert

Maids of Honour

A small almond tartlet made with puff pastry, almonds, sugar, flour, eggs, cream, and orange flower water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Maids of Honour

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Blanch and dry the almonds, then pound them with the sugar until fine.

  2. Add the yolks of eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  3. Stir in the flour, cream, and orange‑flower water until combined.

Assemble and bake

  1. Line 8 or 9 small tartlet molds with the puff pastry.

  2. Fill the molds with the almond mixture.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.

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. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Jordan almonds
Provide the main body and nutty flavour of the filling.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps it brown as it bakes.
Yolks of eggs
Bind the filling and help it set when baked.
Fine flour
Gives the filling structure so it holds its shape when baked.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the filling tender.
Puff paste
Forms the flaky pastry shell that holds the filling.

The step that matters

Pounding the almonds with the sugar until fine. Coarse almond pieces leave a gritty texture and uneven filling. Grinding them finely with sugar releases oils and creates a smooth, evenly set almond paste.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, almond, flour, 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.

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