Name: Fruit and Nut Creams
Ingredients: 1 cup raisins, seeded and chopped; 1 cup currants; 1 cup figs, chopped; 1 cup citron, chopped; 2 cups uncooked French cream; 1 cup chopped nuts (almonds, hickory nuts, butternuts, or English walnuts)

Why it works: Raisin and fig work together. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 737 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Fruit and Nut Creams

Ingredients

1 cup raisins, seeded and chopped
1 cup currants
1 cup figs, chopped
1 cup citron, chopped
2 cups uncooked French cream
1 cup chopped nuts (almonds, hickory nuts, butternuts, or English walnuts)

Directions

Make the mixture

In a bowl, mix the chopped raisins, currants, figs, and citron with the uncooked French cream while it is still soft.
Gradually add sugar until fully mixed in.
Stir in the chopped nuts of your choice.

Shape

Form the mixture into balls, bars, or squares.

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.

Raisin + figtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together737 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Raisin + nutstop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together490 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together6,180 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).
Currant + figtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together276 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Fig + nutstop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together154 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Uncooked french cream: Forms the soft base that binds the fruit and nuts together.
Figs: Add chewy texture and natural sweetness to the mixture.
Raisins: Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness.
Currants: Add tart, chewy bits and extra fruit flavour.
Citron: Adds candied citrus aroma and a chewy, slightly bitter note.
Nuts: Add crunch and contrast to the soft, chewy fruit base.