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Dessert

Balmoral Tartlets

A sweet tartlet with cherries, ginger, and cake crumbs baked in short pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour 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 ↓

Balmoral Tartlets

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the batter

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Add the egg yolks and mix well.

  3. Stir in the cherries, ginger, flour, cornflour, and cake crumbs.

  4. Beat the egg whites until very stiff, then gently fold them into the mixture.

Fill and bake

  1. Line patty pans with short pastry.

  2. Fill the pastry shells three-quarters full with the mixture.

  3. Sprinkle with caster sugar.

  4. Bake for about 20 minutes at 350°F (175°C).

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + gingertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,564 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Eggs
Egg whites are beaten to add lightness, and yolks enrich the batter and help bind it.
Butter
Creaming with sugar traps air and gives the tartlets a tender, rich texture.
Sugar
Creamed with butter for structure and sweetness, and sprinkled on top for a crisp finish.
Flour
Provides the main structure that holds the filling together as it bakes.
Cornflour
Softens the crumb, giving a more tender, delicate texture than flour alone.
Dried chopped cherries
Add sweetness, chewiness and fruity flavour to the filling.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Overbeaten or deflated whites lose the air that lightens the batter. Fold gently so the mixture stays airy and rises evenly in the tartlets.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Jalapenofits better
  4. Gingerthe original

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