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Dessert

Filbert Macaroons

A sweet treat made from scalded filbert kernels, sugar, bitter almond essence, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Filbert and almond work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 80 recipes. Both carry acetylpyrazine, which smells roast. The science ↓

Filbert Macaroons

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the paste

  1. Pound the filberts with the essence and the egg whites until smooth.

  2. Mix in the sugar until the paste is firm.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll the paste into small balls, about the size of a walnut.

  2. Arrange the balls on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until they are a light color.

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. Filbert + almondtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together80 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetylpyrazine (roast).

  2. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  4. Almond + eggtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,645 recipes

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

  5. Filbert + eggtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together86 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Filberts
Provide the nutty body and fat that give the macaroons their dense, chewy texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps firm the paste so the balls hold their shape.
Egg whites
Bind the ground nuts and sugar into a smooth paste that holds together while baking.

The step that matters

Bake until a light color. Sugar and proteins brown quickly in the oven, so pulling the macaroons when they reach a light color keeps them from darkening, drying out, or turning bitter.

Swap the filbert

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

  1. Pistachiofits better
  2. Hazelnutfits better
  3. Brazil nutfits better
  4. Filbertthe original

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