Why it works: Flour and almond 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 ↓
Almond Jumbles
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, mix the flour and baking powder.
Make the batter
In another bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light.
Beat the egg yolks and stir them into the butter and sugar mixture.
Add the pounded almonds and lemon extract, mixing well.
Fold in half of the flour mixture, then the beaten egg whites, and finally the remaining flour.
Spoon the batter into well-buttered muffin pans.
Bake
Bake until golden brown.
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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Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,673 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,655 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
-
Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,245 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Flour and butter 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
- Eggs
- Egg yolks enrich the batter, and whipped whites lighten its texture as they are folded in.
- Butter
- Creamed with sugar, it traps air and gives the jumbles a tender, rich texture.
- Sugar
- Creamed with butter, it helps create a light base and adds sweetness and browning.
- Flour
- Provides the structure that holds the jumbles together as they bake.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas in the batter, helping the jumbles rise and become light.
- Blanched almonds
- Pounded fine, they add body, moisture and a nutty flavour to the batter.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Whipped whites hold the air that lightens the batter. Folding gently in alternation with the flour keeps that air from collapsing, so the jumbles rise lightly instead of turning dense.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar, butter, almond, egg):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar, butter, almond, egg. 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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