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Dessert

Old Stlye Molasses Pepper

Molasses Pepper is a candy made from molasses, butter, and peppermint oil, shaped into sticks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and peppermint work together. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 958 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Old Stlye Molasses Pepper

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Combine molasses and butter in a large pot.

  2. Cook over medium heat until the mixture reaches 252°F (122°C).

  3. Pour the mixture onto a slab and let it cool until it is safe to handle.

  4. Fold the edges of the cooled mixture to form one lump.

  5. Cut off 2 pounds of the batch and leave it on the slab as a lump.

Pull and shape

  1. Pull the remaining batch on a hook until it turns a nice golden color.

  2. Add oil of peppermint while pulling.

  3. Lay the pulled candy on a spinning table.

  4. Shape the pulled candy into a round piece about 12 to 14 inches long.

  5. Take the 2 pounds of reserved candy and roll it out.

  6. Cut the rolled candy into 4 or 5 pieces.

  7. Place these pieces on the large batch about 4 inches apart along its length.

  8. Shape the entire batch into a nice round form.

  9. Pull the batch to the size of stick candy.

  10. Cut the candy into half-inch lengths.

Wrap

  1. Wrap the candy in wax paper if it is hot outside.

  2. Do not wrap the candy in cold weather.

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. Butter + pepperminttop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together958 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Molasses + buttertop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Molasses + pepperminttop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together65 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

New orleans molasses
Provides the dark color, rich flavor and sweetness that give the candy its body.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the candy's texture and keeps it from becoming brittle.

The step that matters

Cooking to 252°F (122°C). Sugar concentration determines firmness once cooled. Stopping short leaves the candy soft and sticky, while overcooking makes it hard and brittle.

Swap the peppermint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, butter):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Peppermintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, butter. 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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