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Fondant for Cheap Centers

Fondant is a sugar confection made by cooking sugar, glucose, water, and gelatin, then cooling and adding egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

Fondant for Cheap Centers

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Dissolve 75 lbs of sugar and 5 lbs of glucose in water and cook to 238°F (114°C).

  2. Pour the mixture onto a damp slab and immediately add 30 lbs of warm glucose.

  3. Cream the mixture while it is at blood heat.

Add gelatine and cook the syrup

  1. Dissolve 24 oz of French gelatin in 1 qt of hot water and set aside.

  2. Cook 30 lbs of sugar, 6 qts of water, and 2 teaspoons of cream of tartar to 262°F (128°C).

  3. Remove from heat and add the gelatin mixture.

  4. Pour onto a damp slab and let it cool.

Finish and shape

  1. Once cool, add the whites of 6 well-beaten eggs and cream the mixture.

  2. Divide into several parts, flavor each, roll out to desired size, and dip in bittersweet chocolate.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Forms the crystalline body of the fondant when cooked and creamed.
Glucose
Interferes with sugar crystallisation, keeping the fondant smooth and soft.
French gelatine
Adds body and helps the fondant hold its shape and texture.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the syrup, helping prevent sugar from crystallising too large.
Egg whites
Add moisture and body, making the creamed fondant softer and more pliable.

The step that matters

Creaming the mixture at blood heat. Creaming while the syrup is still warm but not hot encourages fine, small sugar crystals, giving a smooth texture. If it is too hot or left to set fully before creaming, the fondant can turn grainy or hard to work.

“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.

More fondant recipes

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