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Dessert

Date Tarts

A baked tart made with dates, almonds, egg whites, sugar, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Date Tarts

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.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Chop the almonds and dates together using a meat chopper.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff, then gradually add half of the sugar.

  2. Add the vanilla and fold in the chopped almonds and dates mixed with the remaining sugar.

  3. Pour the mixture into a shallow buttered pan.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake for 1 hour, then cut into bars while hot and remove from the pan.

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. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Almond + datestop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together217 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Dates + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together218 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Beaten until stiff, they trap air and give the tarts a light, airy structure.
Almonds
Provide bulk and a nutty texture that holds the bars together.
Dates
Add natural sweetness and moisture, giving a chewy texture.
Fruit sugar
Sweetens the mixture and helps it brown slightly during baking.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites until stiff. Egg whites must be beaten to a stiff foam before folding in the other ingredients. Under-beaten whites lack the air needed for lift, and over-mixing after folding deflates the foam, leaving dense bars.

Swap the dates

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

  1. Figfits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Datesthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, almond, sugar, vanilla, butter. 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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