Why it works: Almond and olive match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,875 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Salt Almonds or Peanuts
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the almonds
Pour boiling water over the almonds and let them sit until the skins can be easily removed.
Dry the almonds between towels.
Fry and salt
Heat olive oil or lard in a pan.
Fry the almonds in batches until they are a delicate brown.
Drain on tissue paper and sprinkle with coarse sea salt.
For peanuts, pour boiling water over them and boil for a few minutes.
Remove the skins and dry thoroughly.
Fry the peanuts in olive oil or lard until they are a delicate brown.
Drain on tissue paper and sprinkle with coarse sea salt.
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 + olivetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Almonds
- Frying browns the skin-free nuts and gives them a crisp texture and nutty aroma.
- Large unroasted peanuts
- Frying browns the nuts and gives them a crisp texture and roasted aroma.
- Olive oil or lard
- Frying fat conducts heat evenly and carries the browning flavour into the nut surface.
The step that matters
Drying the nuts before frying. Any surface water turns to steam in hot oil, which makes it spatter and cools the oil, so the nuts steam rather than brown. Thorough drying lets the surface crisp and brown evenly.
“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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