Why it works: Corn and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and 7,168 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Corn Starch Candy
Ingredients
Directions
Make the candy
Combine a cup of water with a cup of sugar and set on the fire to boil.
Do not stir after it begins to boil.
Dissolve two teaspoonfuls of corn starch in a little water.
When the candy will harden in water, add the dissolved corn starch, stirring rapidly.
Finish and pull
When done, pour out into a pan, add flavoring, and pull.
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. See the original page.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Corn + sugartop 21% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together7,168 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sugar
- Forms the sweet base that boils down and hardens into the candy.
- Corn starch
- Thickens the syrup and helps give the candy a smooth, tender texture.
- Water
- Dissolves the sugar so it can boil into a syrup.
The step that matters
Do not stir after it begins to boil. Stirring a boiling sugar syrup can make crystals form, causing a grainy rather than smooth candy. Leaving it still lets the syrup cook evenly.
“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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