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Almond Toffee

A sweet almond confection made by boiling sugar with water and cream of tartar, then adding almonds and almond essence.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Almond Toffee

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the almonds

  1. Blanch and skin the almonds.

  2. Cut them in half.

  3. Dry them in the oven without browning.

Make the toffee

  1. Dissolve the sugar in the water.

  2. Add the cream of tartar.

  3. Boil until a deep amber syrup forms.

  4. Remove the saucepan from the heat.

  5. Add the almonds and almond essence.

  6. Bring to a boil again.

  7. Pour the mixture onto a greased or oiled tin.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Almond + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  3. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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

Sugar
Forms the toffee base and, once caramelised to amber, provides the sweetness and flavour.
Almonds
Add crunch and a nutty flavour that contrasts with the soft, brittle toffee.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the syrup, helping prevent sugar crystallising into grainy texture.

The step that matters

Boil until a deep amber syrup forms. Sugar caramelises quickly near the end of cooking, so the colour can shift from amber to bitter-burnt within seconds. Removing the pan from the heat at the right colour keeps the toffee sweet and brittle rather than acrid.

Swap the almond

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream. 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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