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Dessert

Baker’s Fondant

Baker's Fondant is a sugar confection made by boiling sugar, maize syrup, and water, then cooling and creaming until stiff.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and syrup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Baker’s Fondant

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Combine water and sugar in a pan and heat while stirring until dissolved.

  2. Add maize syrup and stir well.

  3. Wash the sides of the pan with a damp sponge.

  4. Once boiling, remove any scum that rises, cover the pan, and boil for 3 to 5 minutes.

  5. Remove the lid and insert a thermometer.

  6. Continue boiling until the mixture reaches 240°F (115°C).

Cool and cream

  1. Remove from heat and wipe the slab with a damp cloth or sprinkle lightly with cold water.

  2. Pour the sugar mixture onto the slab. If using bars, lightly sprinkle the top.

  3. If using a small slab and bars, allow to rest for 20 minutes before creaming.

  4. When the mixture is cool enough to touch, begin creaming with a wooden spatula until it turns white and stiff.

  5. Continue stirring until no clear sugar remains, then scrape into a heap and cover with a damp cloth or press into a box.

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 + syruptop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 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

Sugar
Provides sweetness and forms the crystal structure of the fondant.
Maize syrup
Interferes with crystal formation, producing a smoother, less grainy fondant.

The step that matters

Continue boiling until the mixture reaches 240°F (115°C). The final sugar concentration sets the fondant's texture. Stopping early leaves it soft and sticky, while overcooking makes it hard and brittle once creamed.

“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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