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Sauce

Yellow Sauce for Puddings

A sweet yellow sauce made with butter, powdered sugar, egg yolks, egg whites, and sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sherry are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,505 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Yellow Sauce for Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  2. Gradually add the powdered sugar and mix until light.

  3. Add the yolks of 3 eggs gradually, mixing well.

  4. Fold in the beaten whites of 2 eggs.

  5. Flavor with sherry to taste.

  6. Place the bowl in a pan of boiling water to heat.

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. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + sherrytop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,141 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

Butter
Adds richness and creates a smooth, creamy base for the sauce.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the sauce and dissolves easily, helping the creamed mixture become light.
Egg yolks
Enrich the sauce and thicken it as the gentle heat sets their proteins.
Egg whites
Folded in whites add airy lightness to the sauce's texture.

The step that matters

Place the bowl in a pan of boiling water to heat.. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat, but strong or direct heat can scramble them. Keeping the bowl over simmering-level heat, with the water below the bowl's base, lets the sauce thicken smoothly.

“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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