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Dessert

Macaroon Tarts

A pastry tart filled with almond mixture and raspberry jam, topped with pastry strips.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and raspberry match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 552 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Macaroon Tarts

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Line patty tins with the pastry.

  3. Put a little raspberry jam in the bottom of each tin.

Make the filling

  1. Mix the ground almonds and sugar together.

  2. Add enough beaten egg whites to moisten the mixture nicely.

Assemble and bake

  1. Fill with the almond mixture and smooth with a knife dipped in cold water.

  2. Decorate with strips of pastry across the top.

  3. Bake in the preheated oven 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.

  1. Almond + raspberrytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together552 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Raspberry + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,101 recipes

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

  5. Egg + almondtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,645 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg whites moisten the almond mixture and help it set and hold its shape when baked.
Ground almonds
Provide the dense, moist, chewy body and nutty flavour of the macaroon filling.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the filling brown as it bakes.
Puff or flaky pastry
Forms the crisp, buttery case and top that hold the filling.
Raspberry jam
Adds fruity sweetness and acidity that contrasts with the almond filling.

The step that matters

Moistening the almond mixture with egg white. Too little egg white leaves the mixture crumbly and dry, while too much makes it wet and slack. Aim for a mixture that holds together and spreads smoothly, since the egg white sets and binds the filling as it bakes.

Swap the raspberry

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, almond, sugar. 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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