Why it works: Sugar and hazelnut work together. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 649 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Hazel Nut Cakes
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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Make the batter
In a bowl, combine the sugar and chopped hazelnuts.
Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form.
Gently fold the egg whites into the sugar and hazelnut mixture.
Bake
Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto baking sheets.
Bake for 15-20 minutes or until lightly golden.
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.
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Sugar + hazelnuttop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together649 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Hazelnut + eggtop 28% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together518 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg whites
- Whipped into stiff peaks, they lighten the mixture and give the cakes their airy structure.
- Hazelnuts
- Provide the bulk of the cakes and a nutty flavour, and their oils help keep the texture moist.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cakes and helps them brown lightly in the oven.
The step that matters
Folding the egg whites into the mixture. Stirring vigorously knocks out the air whipped into the egg whites, so the cakes spread flat and turn dense. Fold gently, just until no white streaks remain.
Swap the hazelnut
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg):
- Pecansfits better
- Almondfits better
- Chestnutfits about as well
- Hazelnutthe original
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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