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Dessert

French Crackers

A sweet, buttery cracker made with sugar, butter, flour, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

French Crackers

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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the flour gradually, mixing until well combined.

  4. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  5. Gently fold the egg whites into the mixture.

Shape and bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto a baking sheet.

  2. Brush the tops with egg white and dip in sugar.

  3. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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 add richness and a tender, short texture.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the crackers together as they bake.
Eggs
Whites are whipped and folded in to lighten the batter; whites brushed on tops help the sugar coating brown.
Sugar
Sweetens the crackers and helps the tops brown and crisp in the oven.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites beaten to stiff peaks trap air that lifts the batter. Folding gently keeps that air in; vigorous stirring deflates it and leaves the crackers dense.

“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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