Why it works: Walnut and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,149 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Walnuts Candied
Ingredients
Directions
Make a syrup as directed for candied chestnuts, adding the noyeau liqueur for flavor.
Treat the walnuts in the same way as the chestnuts.
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.
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Walnut + lemontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,149 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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Walnut + eggtop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,037 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 44,316 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
Swap the walnut
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, lemon):
- Milletfits about as well
- Pistachiofits about as well
- Chickpeafits about as well
- Walnutthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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