Skip to main content
Dessert

Genoese Pastry

A sweet pastry made with eggs, sugar, flour, butter, and jam, baked until pale brown.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Genoese Pastry

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.

Prepare

  1. In a large basin, combine the eggs and sugar.

  2. Sift the flour and set aside.

  3. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  4. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and grease it with the melted butter.

Make the batter

  1. Place the basin with eggs and sugar over a saucepan of hot water and whisk for 20 minutes.

  2. Remove from heat, pour in the warm butter, and sift in the flour.

  3. Pour the mixture into the prepared baking sheet and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about 20 minutes, until pale brown and firm.

Finish and serve

  1. While baking, warm the jam in a saucepan.

  2. Once the pastry is done, turn it out onto a sugared paper, remove the greased paper, and spread the warm jam evenly over it.

  3. Roll it up or cut it in half, fold it, and cut into squares.

  4. Let cool before serving.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Eggs
Whisked with sugar over heat, they trap air and form the light, sponge-like structure.
Flour
Sets the crumb structure once baked, giving the sponge body and firmness.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender texture, and helps the crumb stay moist.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the sponge and helps stabilise the whisked egg foam.
Jam
Adds sweetness and fruity flavour, and moisture under the rolled sponge.

The step that matters

Whisking the eggs and sugar over hot water. Warming the eggs and sugar lets the foam reach full volume and hold air. Under-whisking leaves a dense pastry, and overheating can scramble the eggs.

“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.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes