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Dessert

Pecan Egg Kisses

A baked treat of beaten egg whites, sugar, and pecans.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and pecans are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,280 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Pecan Egg Kisses

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the batter

  1. Combine egg whites and sugar in a bowl and beat for one hour.

  2. Gently stir in the chopped pecans.

Shape and bake

  1. Prepare baking pans by lining them with brown paper.

  2. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto the paper.

  3. Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for one hour.

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. Egg + pecanstop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,280 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

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

  3. Sugar + pecanstop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,962 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped with sugar to create an airy foam that gives the kisses their light structure.
Sugar
Sweetens the kisses and stabilises the beaten egg white foam, helping it hold its shape.
Pecans
Add texture and a toasty, nutty flavour to the baked kisses.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites and sugar. Beating for a full hour builds a stable foam; if the whites are under-beaten or greasy, the kisses will spread and bake up dense. Sugar added while beating helps the foam hold its air during baking.

Swap the pecans

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

  1. Pecansthe original
  2. Almondfits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Milletfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, 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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