Name: Walnut Creams
Ingredients: 1 egg white; 1 cup powdered sugar; Walnuts; Flavoring (to taste)

Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Walnut Creams

Ingredients

1 egg white
1 cup powdered sugar
Walnuts
Flavoring (to taste)

Directions

In a bowl, mix the egg white with powdered sugar until stiff enough to roll into small balls.
Shape the mixture into balls and place half a walnut on each side.
Add flavoring to the mixture as desired.

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.

Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together122,807 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg + walnuttop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,037 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + walnuttop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,147 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).