Name: Small Almond Cakes
Ingredients: 1 pound butter, softened; ½ pound finely powdered loaf sugar; ½ pound dried and sifted flour; ½ pound blanched sweet almonds, cut into thin bits; 1 egg, well beaten; 1 teaspoon rose water

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 ↓

Small Almond Cakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

1 pound butter, softened
½ pound finely powdered loaf sugar
½ pound dried and sifted flour
½ pound blanched sweet almonds, cut into thin bits
1 egg, well beaten
1 teaspoon rose water

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
In a bowl, cream the butter until smooth.

Mix and bake

Add the sugar, flour, almonds, beaten egg, and rose water; mix well.
Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto wafer paper or baking tins.
Bake 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.

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).
Almond + rosetop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,465 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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: Creamed to add richness and a tender, fine crumb to the cakes.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the cakes brown as they bake.
Flour: Provides the structure that holds the spooned cakes together.
Almonds: Add nutty flavor and body to the batter.
Egg: Binds the batter and adds structure as it sets in the oven.

The step that matters

Baking until golden. Butter-rich batters brown quickly once the sugar caramelizes, so the cakes can scorch before they set. Watch for a light golden color rather than relying only on the time.

“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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Small Almond Cakes