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Dessert

A Winter Dessert

A dessert of macarons folded with whipped cream and candied fruit, served chilled on pineapple.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Quince and pineapple share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 56 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

A Winter Dessert

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break the macarons into pieces.

  2. Cut the candied cherries into quarters or use other fruits as desired.

Make the cream

  1. In a bowl, beat the heavy cream until solid.

  2. Add the sugar and flavoring to the cream and mix well.

Combine and serve

  1. Pour the cream mixture over the macarons and fruit, and mix thoroughly.

  2. Chill before serving.

  3. Serve the mixture on a slice of pineapple.

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. Quince + pineappletop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together56 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + pineappletop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,841 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Quince + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,444 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Cream + pineappletop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,574 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Heavy cream
Whipped into a stiff foam that gives the dessert its light, creamy body.
Macarons
Soften as they absorb moisture from the cream, giving a tender, cake-like texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the cream and helps it hold its whipped structure.
Candied cherries
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness that contrast with the cream.

The step that matters

Beat the cream until solid. Cream must be whipped to stiff peaks so it holds air and keeps its shape when mixed with the macarons. Under-whipped cream turns runny and makes the dessert soggy, while over-whipping can turn it grainy.

Swap the quince

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, sugar, pineapple):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Bananafits better
  4. Quincethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, pineapple. 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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