Why it works: Almond and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,679 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Almond Paste
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the almonds
Blanch the almonds and place them in cold water for 1–2 hours.
Wipe the almonds and pound them into a fine paste, adding cold water as needed to prevent oiling.
Make the paste
Mix the sugar thoroughly into the almond paste.
Transfer the mixture to a small preserving pan and stir over a gentle heat until it no longer sticks to your fingers.
Pour the paste into an earthen pan or jar and let it cool before use.
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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Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together15,679 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Almonds
- Provide the bulk of the paste, with their oils and flavour carrying the dish.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the paste and, with gentle heat, helps it firm into a workable mass.
- Cold water
- Keeps the paste from releasing oil during pounding, so it stays smooth.
The step that matters
Pounding with cold water. Almonds release oil as they are crushed, and friction heat can make the paste greasy and grainy. Adding small amounts of cold water keeps the temperature down and the paste smooth.
“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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