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Dessert

Almond Cheese Cakes

A sweet almond cake with butter, sugar, eggs, nutmeg, lemon peel, orange‑flower water, and brandy, baked in pastry‑lined pans.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Almond Cheese Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Blanch and pound the sweet and bitter almonds with a little orange‑flower water.

  2. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and egg whites with the powdered sugar.

  3. Add the melted butter when it is nearly cold, along with the grated nutmeg and lemon peel.

  4. Mix in the orange‑flower water and ratafia or brandy until well combined.

Bake

  1. Line patty pans with pastry and fill with the mixture.

  2. Bake until set and lightly 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. Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Almond + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Nutmeg + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

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

  5. Nutmeg + orangetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,746 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks and whites bind the filling and help it set firm when baked.
Almonds
Pounded almonds give the filling body and a rich, nutty texture.
Butter
Melted butter adds fat for richness and a tender, moist crumb.
Powdered sugar
Sugar sweetens the filling and helps it brown lightly in the oven.

The step that matters

Add the melted butter when nearly cold. Butter that is too hot can scramble the beaten eggs and cause the filling to curdle or separate. Letting it cool slightly keeps the mixture smooth and evenly textured.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, egg, sugar, butter, nutmeg, lemon, brandy. 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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