Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
North Pole Candy
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Beat the egg yolks in a small pan with a spoon, then pour in the maraschino and stir until it becomes creamy.
Make the threads
Boil the clarified sugar until it reaches a blow stage.
Using a funnel with a small bore, pour the egg mixture into the boiling sugar until exhausted, then remove the mixture from heat.
Use a fork to take out the threads formed, and place the threads on a grating in small heaps, about the size of a half-crown, shaped like rocks.
Dry and candy
Dry the threads for several hours in a stove.
Candy the threads as previously described.
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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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg yolks
- Set into delicate threads when poured into hot sugar, giving the candy its richness and body.
- Maraschino
- Adds its liqueur flavour and aroma and makes the yolk mixture creamy.
- Clarified sugar
- Forms the sweet base that, boiled to a blow stage, sets the yolk threads into candy.
The step that matters
Pouring the egg mixture into the boiling sugar. The yolk mixture must enter the hot sugar slowly through a small funnel. Each thin stream sets into a thread on contact with the hot syrup. Pouring too fast or too thick clumps the yolk instead of forming separate threads.
“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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