Name: Almond Puffs
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons flour; 2 oz. butter; 2 oz. powdered sugar; 2 oz. sweet almonds; 4 bitter almonds

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 Puffs

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

Blanch and pound the sweet and bitter almonds in a mortar to a smooth paste.
Melt the butter in a bowl, then mix in the flour and powdered sugar.
Add the pounded almonds to the mixture and beat well.

Bake and serve

Butter small cups or jelly pots, then fill them with the mixture.
Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 20 minutes, or longer if the puffs are large.
Turn the puffs out onto a dish with the bottom side facing up and serve.

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.

Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,673 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,245 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Sweet almonds: Provide the main almond flavour and body of the puff mixture.
Butter: Adds fat for a rich, tender texture and helps the puffs brown.
Flour: Gives the mixture structure so the puffs hold their shape when baked.
Powdered sugar: Adds sweetness and dissolves smoothly into the batter.

“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.