Name: Caraway Comfits
Ingredients: Caraway seeds; Syrup (without gum); Double-refined white sugar

Why it works: Syrup and sugar match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Caraway Comfits

Ingredients

Caraway seeds
Syrup (without gum)
Double-refined white sugar

Directions

Clean the caraway seeds and place them in a pan over hot coals to keep warm.
Cover the seeds with syrup without gum.
On the fourth day, smooth the comfits with double-refined white sugar boiled to the 'Small Thread.'
Charge the comfits three times without fire beneath, ensuring they are well worked for a good gloss.
Pearl them with syrup boiled to the 'Pearl' and dropped from a suspended funnel.

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.

Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,842 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Caraway + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,409 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Caraway + syruptop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together29 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).