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Dessert

Peanut Squares

A sweet treat made from sugar, glucose, water, and roasted peanuts, cooked to 280°F and cut into squares.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and peanut are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 27% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,545 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Peanut Squares

Ingredients

Directions

Make the brittle

  1. In a large pot, combine sugar, glucose, and water.

  2. Cook the mixture over medium heat until it reaches 280°F (138°C).

  3. Remove from heat and stir in the roasted peanuts.

Shape and cut

  1. Pour the mixture onto a slab and roll it out to your desired thickness.

  2. Cut into one-inch 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 + peanuttop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,545 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Granulated sugar
Forms the crystalline candy base that sets crisp and firm as it cools.
Glucose
Interferes with sugar crystallization, keeping the candy smooth and less grainy.
Roasted peanuts
Provide the main bulk, nutty flavor and crunch throughout the candy.

The step that matters

Cooking to 280°F (138°C). Sugar syrup must reach the right temperature to set firm once cooled. Too low and the squares stay sticky; too high and they turn bitter or brittle to the point of breaking.

“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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