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Dessert

Almond Sauce

A sweet almond sauce made with almonds, orange‑flower water, cream, powdered sugar, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and orange are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,125 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Almond Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Pound the almonds with the orange-flower water.

  2. Pour the boiling cream over the almond mixture.

  3. Add the powdered sugar and stir until well mixed.

  4. Thicken the sauce with the beaten egg yolks.

  5. Set over low heat and beat to a froth.

Serve

  1. Serve with or over any good pudding.

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 + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Almond + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

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

  5. Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,212 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Orange and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
Pounded into the base, they give the sauce its body and nutty flavour.
Egg yolks
Thicken the sauce as they gently set with heat, giving it a smooth, rich texture.
Boiling cream
Adds richness and moisture, and carries the almond flavour through the sauce.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the sauce and dissolves easily into the warm cream mixture.
Orange-flower water
Adds a floral, aromatic note that flavours the almonds.

The step that matters

Set over low heat and beat to a froth. Egg yolks can scramble if the heat is too high. Gentle heat, with constant beating, thickens the sauce smoothly before it curdles.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (almond, cream, sugar, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, cream, sugar, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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