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Dessert

Rolled Almond Wafers

Rolled almond wafers are thin baked squares of butter, flour, sugar, milk, vanilla, and almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Rolled Almond Wafers

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  3. Gradually add the fruit sugar, then slowly mix in the milk.

  4. Add the bread flour and vanilla extract; mix thoroughly.

Shape and bake

  1. Spread the mixture very thinly on a buttered baking sheet.

  2. Mark the mixture into 3-inch squares and sprinkle with chopped almonds.

  3. Bake until a delicate brown.

  4. Remove the baking sheet from the oven.

Finish

  1. Separate the squares.

  2. Turn them over.

  3. Roll quickly.

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. Vanilla + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Vanilla + milktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  4. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  5. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creamed with the sugar, it adds richness and a tender, crisp texture to the wafers.
Bread flour
Provides the small amount of structure that holds the thin wafer together while baking.
Fruit sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps the wafers brown as they bake.
Milk
Adds moisture to the batter so it spreads thinly and evenly.
Almonds
Add nutty flavour and a crisp, toasted texture on the surface.

The step that matters

Roll quickly. The wafers stiffen as they cool, so they must be rolled while still hot and pliable. If they cool too much they will crack instead of curling.

Swap the almond

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, bread, flour, sugar, vanilla, milk):

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Chestnutfits about as well
  3. Cocoafits less well
  4. Hazelnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, bread, flour, sugar, vanilla, milk. 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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