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
Make the yolk mixture
Beat the egg yolks in a small pan with a spoon.
Pour in the maraschino and stir until creamy.
Make the threads
Boil the clarified sugar until it reaches a boil.
Use a funnel to pour the mixture into the boiling sugar, allowing it to run through the syrup.
Remove from heat and use a fork to take out the threads formed.
Dry and finish
Place the threads on a grating in small heaps, about the size of a half crown, shaped like rocks.
Dry the threads in a stove for several hours.
Candy them as previously mentioned, covering and finishing as desired.
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
- Form the threads and give the candy its rich, creamy body.
- Maraschino
- Adds liqueur flavour and thins the yolk mixture so it pours through the funnel.
- Clarified sugar
- Forms the syrup that sets the yolk threads into a crisp, sweet candy.
The step that matters
Pouring the yolk mixture into the boiling sugar. The yolk mixture must run in as fine threads so they set in the hot syrup. If poured too fast or in a clump, the yolk cooks into lumps instead of 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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