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Almond Macaboons

A sweet almond confection made by baking almond paste with egg whites and sugar.

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

Almond Macaboons

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the almonds

  1. Blanch the almonds, dry them, and place them in a 400°F (200°C) oven to dry completely.

  2. Pound the almonds into a smooth paste, adding a little egg white.

Make the mixture

  1. Whisk the egg whites to a firm solid froth.

  2. Gradually mix in the sugar with the almond paste and whisk well.

Bake

  1. Drop the mixture onto wafer paper.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until they are a very pale brown.

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. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Almonds
Provide the main body and nutty almond flavour of the macaroon paste.
Egg whites
Whipped to a foam, they add lightness and help bind the paste together.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and, with heat, helps the surface turn golden brown.

The step that matters

Bake until very pale brown. Baking is stopped while the surface is only very pale brown; the sugar and egg proteins brown quickly with heat, so going too far turns the macaroons dark and bitter-tasting.

Swap the almond

The recipe marks almond as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg):

  1. Pecansfits about as well
  2. Almondthe original
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Milletfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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