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Dessert

Timbale a LA St.-Petersbourg

A French molded cake made with eggs, sugar, ground almonds, kirschwasser, butter, flour, marmalade, and pistachios.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and pistachio match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 693 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Timbale a LA St.-Petersbourg

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the batter

  1. In a copper bowl, whisk together the eggs and sugar over low heat for 15-20 minutes.

  2. Add the ground almonds and whisk a little longer.

  3. Melt the butter and mix it alternately with the flour and the egg mixture.

  4. Stir in the kirschwasser.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered mold and bake for 30-35 minutes.

  2. Unmold onto a sieve and let cool.

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 + pistachiotop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Pistachio + nutstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together425 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Almond + apricottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together852 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Almond + nutstop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together394 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Whisked with sugar, they trap air and set into the cake's structure.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps stabilize the whisked egg foam.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender crumb.
Vienna flour
Provides the structure that holds the baked batter together.
Ground almonds
Add moisture and a tender, nutty crumb.
Kirschwasser
Adds a cherry aroma.

The step that matters

Whisking the eggs and sugar over low heat. Gentle heat thickens the eggs and helps the foam hold air, which gives the timbale its light structure. Too much heat can scramble the eggs, while too little whisking leaves a dense result.

Swap the apricot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, almond, butter, flour, pistachio, nuts):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, almond, butter, flour, pistachio, nuts. 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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