Why it works: Sugar and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 98,233 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓
Soft Chewing Butter-scotch
Ingredients
Directions
Make the candy
In a large pot, combine the light brown sugar, glucose, nucoa butter, and regular butter with enough water to dissolve the sugar.
Cook and stir the mixture until it reaches 250°F (120°C).
Remove from heat and flavor with lemon oil.
Set and cut
Pour the mixture onto a greased slab between iron bars.
Once cooled, cut into pieces measuring 2 by 3 inches and wrap in wax paper.
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.
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 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
- Light brown sugar
- Provides the main sweetness and the molasses flavor that defines butterscotch.
- Glucose
- Inhibits sugar crystallization, keeping the candy smooth rather than grainy.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, contributing to a softer bite and buttery flavor.
- Nucoa butter
- Adds additional fat for richness and texture in the candy.
The step that matters
Cooking to 250°F (120°C). Cooking the sugar syrup to the stated temperature controls its water content, which determines whether the candy sets firm or stays soft and sticky once cooled.
“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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