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Dessert

Fig Bak

A sweet fig confection made by cooking figs with sugar, adding cream, and setting into bars.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Fig Bak

Ingredients

Directions

Make the fig paste

  1. Place sugar or syrup in a large pot over heat until it reaches a thread stage.

  2. Cut figs with candy shears or grate them using a coconut grater.

  3. Stir figs into the sugar mixture until it reaches a large thread stage.

  4. Transfer the mixture to a barrel and sieve in pulverized sugar.

  5. Work the mixture with a spatula until it becomes a thick mass.

  6. Pour the mixture onto a sugared slab between iron bars and spread it evenly.

Make the cream layer

  1. Dissolve plain cream in a basin set in another basin of water.

  2. Color the cream pink and flavor it with nectar.

  3. Pour the cream over the fig paste and spread it evenly with a palette knife.

Set and cut

  1. Let it sit for a few hours or overnight, then cut into bars or squares.

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 + figtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Fig + creamtop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together523 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Sugar or crystal syrup
Forms the thread-stage base that sets into the firm body of the cake.
Figs
Provide the fruit flavor and bulk that the cooked sugar holds together.
Pulverized sugar
Stiffens the mixture into a thick mass that can be spread and cut.
Plain cream
Forms a soft, rich layer on top that contrasts with the firm fig paste.

The step that matters

Working the mixture to a thick mass. Sugar syrup that is not cooked to the correct thread stage will not set firmly, and stirring in the sugar and figs while it is still hot helps it thicken evenly. Under-cooked syrup stays sticky and the cake will not cut cleanly.

Swap the fig

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Figthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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