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Dessert

Horehound Candy

A hard candy made from horehound tea, sugar, and cream of tartar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Horehound Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Make the horehound tea

  1. Combine fresh horehound and water in a small pan.

  2. Boil slowly until reduced by one-third.

  3. Remove from heat.

  4. Cool the mixture.

  5. Strain the mixture.

  6. Press out all the juice.

Cook the candy

  1. In a copper kettle, add sugar and enough water to dissolve.

  2. Heat and stir until dissolved.

  3. Wash down the sides of the pan.

  4. Add cream of tartar.

  5. Cook to 330°F (165 °C).

  6. Slowly add the horehound tea, ensuring the sugar doesn't overflow.

  7. Cook to 335°F (170 °C).

  8. Add a little red color.

  9. Boil again.

Shape the candy

  1. Pour onto a greased slab.

  2. Fold in the edges as it cools.

  3. Turn until cool enough to handle.

  4. Form into a smooth lump.

  5. Stretch and spin out like stick candy or run through a drop machine.

  6. In hot weather, sugar the candy when cold.

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).

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh horehound
Provides the characteristic bitter herbal flavor that the candy is built around.
Sugar
Forms the candy mass, providing sweetness and the firm, glassy structure as it cooks.
Cream of tartar
Acidity that helps prevent sugar from crystallizing, keeping the candy smooth.

The step that matters

Slowly add the horehound tea. Adding liquid to boiling sugar can cause it to foam up and overflow, and pouring slowly controls the boil. Reaching the set temperatures afterward determines whether the candy turns out firm or sticky.

“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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