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Dessert

Peppermints

A hard peppermint candy made by boiling sugar and water, then adding cream of tartar and peppermint oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Peppermints

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the syrup

  1. Boil sugar and water for 6 to 8 minutes.

  2. Add cream of tartar and oil of peppermint after removing from heat.

Beat and shape

  1. Beat until creamy white.

  2. Drop by teaspoon onto a clean, bright tin sheet.

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 + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Cream + pepperminttop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together632 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Sugar + pepperminttop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,082 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

Sugar
Forms the candy's structure and provides its sweetness as it cooks and sets.
Cream of tartar
Its acidity helps prevent the sugar from crystallizing into a grainy texture.
Oil of peppermint
Provides the candy's characteristic peppermint aroma and flavor.

The step that matters

Boil sugar and water for 6 to 8 minutes. Boiling concentrates the sugar syrup, and the boiling time determines how firm the candy sets. Too little time leaves it soft and sticky, while too much makes it hard and brittle.

Swap the peppermint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Gingerfits about as well
  4. Peppermintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream. 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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