Skip to main content
Dessert

Hickoey-nut Cups

A confection made from hickory nuts, cream, sugar, and optional butter, vanilla, molasses, and figs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Vanilla and fig match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Hickoey-nut Cups

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Place the chopped hickory nuts in a bowl with the cream. As the cream warms, work the nuts through it.

  2. Add the sugar and cream of tartar. Cook until the sugar begins to turn, about 330°F (165°C). Pour out the mixture at once.

Pull and shape

  1. When cool, pull until it has a white satin appearance. Remove from the hook.

  2. Shape as for butter cups. Place cream across the center. Fold the edges over. Spin out as before.

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. Vanilla + figtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together324 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Nuts + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together638 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  5. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Hickory nuts
Add the main flavor and a firm, crunchy texture to the candy.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, giving the candy a smooth, creamy body.
Sugar
Provides sweetness and, once cooked and worked, forms the candy's structure.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the sugar syrup, helping prevent unwanted large sugar crystals.

The step that matters

Cook until the sugar begins to turn, about 330°F (165°C).. As water boils off, sugar concentration rises, so the final temperature sets how firm the candy becomes when pulled. Too low and it stays soft; too high and it browns and turns bitter.

“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.

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesMolasses Sponge CakeMolasses Sponge Cake9 recipes