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Dessert

Date Tart

A baked tart made with dates, powdered sugar, egg yolks, chocolate, spices, pecans, biscuits, citron, egg whites, and whiskey.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Date Tart

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. In a bowl, beat the powdered sugar and egg yolks until creamy.

  2. Add the creamed chocolate, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, chopped dates, powdered biscuits, pecans, and citron. Mix well.

  3. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  4. Gently fold the egg whites into the mixture and pour in the whiskey.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 1 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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Cinnamon + datestop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together283 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  5. Cinnamon + biscuittop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together312 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Add richness and bind the batter into a soft, custard-like body.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the batter and help it rise and set.
Powdered biscuits
Thicken the batter and give body to the crumb as they absorb moisture.
Dates
Add moisture and natural sweetness to the filling.
Chocolate
Adds deep flavor, richness and fat to the filling.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whipped whites hold air that gives lift. Folding gently, rather than stirring, keeps that air in the batter so the tart does not turn dense and flat.

Swap the dates

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, chocolate, cinnamon, allspice, clove, biscuit):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Orangefits better
  4. Datesthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, chocolate, cinnamon, allspice, clove, biscuit. 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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