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Dessert

Anchovy Biscuit Paste

A savory paste made from flour, butter, anchovy essence, carmine, red pepper, baking powder, egg, and cold water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

Anchovy Biscuit Paste

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Rub the flour and butter together until smooth.

  2. Add the essence of anchovy, carmine, red pepper, baking powder, and half an egg.

  3. Mix in the cold water until combined.

  4. Roll out the mixture thinly and use as desired.

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. Anchovy + eggtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,330 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Anchovy + peppertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the paste together.
Butter
Adds fat that keeps the mixture tender and short.
Egg
Binds the dough and adds richness and structure.
Baking powder
Releases gas that gives the biscuit a slight lift.
Essence of anchovy
Supplies the salty, savoury flavour that defines the paste.

The step that matters

Roll out the mixture thinly. Handling and mixing develop gluten, which toughens the dough. Rolling it thin keeps the biscuit crisp and lets it bake evenly, so it should not be worked or thickened.

“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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