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Dessert

Griddled Almonds

A sweet treat of almonds caramelized in a sugar syrup until golden brown.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,679 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Griddled Almonds

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Dry the blanched almonds thoroughly.

Make the syrup

  1. In a saucepan, boil the sugar and water until it reaches a 'hair' stage.

Caramelize

  1. Add the blanched almonds to the syrup and cook, stirring occasionally, until they turn a delicate golden brown.

  2. Remove the pan from the heat as soon as the sugar begins to color.

Coat the almonds

  1. Stir the almonds rapidly until the syrup crystallizes and clings to the nuts.

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. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Blanched almonds
Form the crunchy core that the sugar coating clings to and browns around.
Granulated sugar
Provides sweetness and, once cooked and stirred, the crisp crystallized coating.

The step that matters

Remove the pan from the heat as soon as the sugar begins to color. Sugar keeps darkening from residual heat in the pan, so waiting too long can turn the coating bitter and burnt. Pulling it off at the first color keeps the flavor sweet and the golden tone even.

“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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