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Dessert

Corn Candy

A sweet treat made by coating popped corn with molasses, butter, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,345 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Corn Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare 4 quarts of popped corn.

  2. Butter a large tin pan and 2 or 3 large dripping pans.

Make the candy

  1. In a saucepan, boil 3 cups of molasses.

  2. Add 1 tablespoon of butter to the boiling molasses.

  3. Just before removing from heat, stir in ¼ teaspoon of baking soda.

Combine and shape

  1. Pour the candy mixture over the popped corn, stirring well.

  2. Continue adding corn and candy until well mixed.

  3. Press the mixture into the buttered dripping pans to form sheets.

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. Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

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

  2. Corn + molassestop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together644 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Molasses + buttertop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Provides the sweetness, dark colour and sticky body that binds the corn into candy.
Baking soda
Reacts with the hot molasses to create small bubbles that lighten the candy's texture.
Butter
Adds fat for a softer bite and richer flavour in the candy.

The step that matters

Adding the baking soda just before removing from heat. Baking soda reacts vigorously with the acidic hot molasses, releasing gas that foams the mixture. Adding it late, off the heat's peak, keeps the foam from overflowing and gives a lighter, more even texture.

“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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