Why it works: Almond and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,679 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Grilled Almonds
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Dry the almonds thoroughly.
Make the caramel
In a saucepan, cook the sugar and water until it forms long threads when dripped from a spoon.
Add the almonds to the syrup and cook, stirring occasionally.
When the almonds turn a pale yellow-brown, remove from heat immediately to preserve flavor.
Stir until the syrup crystallizes around the almonds.
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 + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together15,679 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Almonds
- Form the crunchy base that the sugar syrup coats and hardens around.
- Sugar
- Provides sweetness and, once cooked, the syrup that crystallizes onto the almonds.
The step that matters
Removing the almonds from heat at pale yellow-brown. Sugar keeps darkening from residual heat after the pan leaves the burner, so removing the almonds at the right colour prevents a bitter, burnt flavour.
“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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