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 ↓
Hoarhound Drops
Ingredients
Directions
Make the infusion
Boil 5 ounces of hoarhound in 3 quarts of water for 5 to 10 minutes.
Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.
Make the drops
Add 12 pounds of sugar and 1 small spoon of cream of tartar (or 2 pounds of glucose) to the strained liquid.
Cook the mixture until it reaches a hard crack stage (290°F to 300°F).
Pour out the mixture and run it through a drops machine or mark with a caramel marker.
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 bulk of the candy and sets into a hard, glassy structure as it cooks.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidifies the syrup, helping prevent crystallization so the candy stays smooth.
- Glucose
- Interferes with sugar crystal formation, keeping the candy clear and less grainy.
- Hoarhound
- Supplies the herbal flavor that gives the drops their characteristic taste.
The step that matters
Cooking to hard crack stage. Sugar syrup must reach about 290°F to 300°F to set hard when cooled. Stopping early leaves drops soft or sticky, while overcooking can scorch the sugar and give a bitter taste.
“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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