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Almond Paste

A historical recipe from Nelson's Home Comforts Thirteenth Edition, by Mary Hooper (1892).

A historical recipe

Nelson's Home Comforts Thirteenth Edition, by Mary Hooper (1892). Project Gutenberg eBook #29519.

From an old book: a historical recipe, not current advice. Its methods, additives and storage may be unsafe by today's standards. Its words name: a substance or vessel no longer considered safe. Check current food-safety guidance before following this.

Source and licence

From Nelson's Home Comforts Thirteenth Edition, by Mary Hooper (1892). Digitised by Project Gutenberg, eBook #29519 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29519). Public domain in the USA; its status may differ elsewhere.

Read the original Public domain in the USA

What was changed: As printed, from the book's text; Project Gutenberg's header and licence removed. Ingredient lines were read out of the text by a program. A historical recipe, not current advice.

  • Additives or old utensils. The text names something no longer considered safe in food or for cooking in, such as lead, alum, borax, bitter almonds or copper pans. Don't use it.

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Ingredients

Method

  1. Blanch one pound of sweet and two ounces of bitter almonds, pound them in a mortar, adding a little rose-water as you go on, to prevent oiling;
  2. and when all the almonds are reduced to a perfectly smooth paste, mix them with an equal weight of icing sugar.
  3. Moisten the paste with a packet of Nelson's Albumen dissolved in three teaspoonfuls of cold water, and spread it evenly on the cake, allowing it to become dry and firm before spreading the icing over it.
  4. This paste can be used for making several kinds of cakes and sweetmeats, and without the Albumen can be kept in bottles for some time.
  5. Almond paste can be made from bitter almonds which have been infused in spirit to make an extract for flavouring, and in this case no sweet almonds will be required.