Name: Hickory-Nut Cookies
Ingredients: 3 eggs; 1½ cups sugar; 1 cup chopped hickory-nut meats

Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Hickory-Nut Cookies

Ingredients

3 eggs
1½ cups sugar
1 cup chopped hickory-nut meats

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.

Make the dough

Beat the eggs until the whites and yolks are well mixed.
Add the chopped hickory-nut meats and sugar to the egg mixture. Mix until well combined.

Bake

Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto a baking sheet.
Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden 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.

Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together122,807 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg + meattop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,432 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Sugar + meattop 34% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,866 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs: Bind the mixture and provide structure as the cookies set in the oven.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the cookies brown as they bake.
Hickory-nut meats: Provide the main nutty flavour and add texture through their chopped pieces.

“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.