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Dessert

Citron Cookies

Cookies made with butter, sugar, eggs, milk, chopped citron, allspice, cloves, baking powder, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Citron Cookies

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Cream together the butter and sugar.

  2. Add the eggs, milk, citron, allspice, and cloves.

  3. Pound the whole spices in a mortar.

  4. Sift the baking powder with the flour before adding.

  5. Add flour to thicken the mixture until stiffer than ordinary cupcake dough.

  6. Test one cookie on a plate; if it runs too much, add more flour.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls onto greased baking sheets.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C).

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Allspice + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,302 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Butter
Creams with the sugar to give the cookies richness and a tender crumb.
Sugar
Sweetens the cookies and helps them brown as they bake.
Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure as the cookies set.
Milk
Adds moisture so the dough can be mixed to a soft consistency.
Citron
Provides chopped candied fruit flavour and a chewy texture throughout.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cookies rise and lighten.

The step that matters

Adding flour to the dough. Too little flour leaves the dough loose so cookies spread and turn thin, while too much makes them dense and dry. Adjusting flour until the dough is stiffer than cupcake batter controls spread and texture.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, milk, allspice, flour):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, milk, allspice, flour. 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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