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A Very Fine Crust for Orange Cheesecakes, or Sweetmeats

A dough crust for orange cheesecakes or sweetmeats, made with flour, sugar, butter, eggs, and baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

A Very Fine Crust for Orange Cheesecakes, or Sweetmeats

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, mix the dried flour with the refined sugar.

  2. Work the softened butter with your hands until frothy.

  3. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter, mixing well.

  4. Incorporate the beaten egg yolks and egg whites into the mixture.

  5. If the dough is too soft, add more flour and sugar until it is rollable.

Bake the crust

  1. Line your tart pans with the dough and fill as desired.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) for about 15 minutes.

Ice and serve

  1. Prepare icing by beating refined sugar with the egg white until thick.

  2. Ice the baked crusts and return them to the oven to harden.

  3. Serve cold.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 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

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the dough that holds the crust together.
Unsalted butter
Adds richness and tenderness, giving the crust its short texture.
Egg yolks
Add richness and help bind the dough together.
Egg whites
Add structure and help the icing set firm and glossy.
Refined sugar
Sweetens the crust and helps it brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Ice the baked crusts and return them to the oven to harden. The icing is made from raw egg white and sugar, which sets through gentle heat rather than cooking hard. Returning the crusts briefly to the oven helps it firm, but too much heat can brown or melt it.

“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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