Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Geneeal Dieections Foe Making Fondant
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Combine sugar and water in a saucepan and add cream of tartar.
Boil the mixture until it reaches 238°F (114°C).
If the temperature exceeds 238°F, add cold water to reduce it.
Cool and work the fondant
Stir the mixture until it hardens, as it will soften if left standing.
If the fondant is too hard, soften it by adding a little syrup at 34 degrees.
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.
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sugar
- Forms the crystalline structure and provides the sweetness that gives fondant its body.
- Cream of tartar
- Adds acidity that partly breaks down sugar, helping keep the fondant smooth rather than grainy.
The step that matters
Boiling to the target temperature. The final temperature sets how much water remains in the syrup, which decides how firm the fondant becomes. Overshooting makes it hard and brittle, while undershooting leaves it soft and runny, so the cook should watch the thermometer closely and correct as the method describes.
“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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