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Dessert

German Chocolate Cookies

Cookies made with eggs, brown sugar, German chocolate, cinnamon, salt, lemon rind, almonds, flour, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,514 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

German Chocolate Cookies

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the dough

  1. Beat the eggs without separating the whites and yolks.

  2. Add brown sugar, grated German chocolate, cinnamon, salt, lemon rind, and chopped almonds.

  3. Mix in flour and sifted baking powder.

Bake

  1. Drop spoonfuls onto buttered baking sheets.

  2. Bake at 300°F (150°C) until set.

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. Cinnamon + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chocolate + almondtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,733 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the dough and help set the cookies as they bake.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the cookies brown.
German chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavor and rich pockets throughout the cookies.
Chopped almonds
Add crunch and a nutty texture to the cookies.
Flour
Gives the dough structure so the cookies hold their shape.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking so the cookies rise and lighten.

The step that matters

Bake at 300°F (150°C) until set. Baking only until the cookies are set keeps them chewy rather than dry. Because the dough is dropped in spoonfuls, the cookies can spread, so watching for firm edges and a set center helps prevent overbaking.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, chocolate, cinnamon, almond, flour):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, chocolate, cinnamon, almond, flour. 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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