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Grapes a LA Niege

Grapes coated in beaten egg white, dusted with powdered sugar, chilled until firm.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Grapes a LA Niege

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the grapes

  1. Wash and dry the grapes, then cut them into small clusters, one for each guest.

Coat the grapes

  1. Whip the egg white until stiff.

  2. Dip the grapes in the beaten egg white.

  3. Sprinkle thoroughly with powdered sugar using a flour sifter.

  4. Set the grapes on ice to harden.

Serve

  1. Serve on grape leaves or lace paper doilies as a first course for luncheon.

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. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Grape + sugartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,490 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Grape + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg white
Dries into a thin, sticky coating that holds the powdered sugar to the grapes.
Powdered sugar
Forms a sweet, crisp, frosted coating on the outside of the grapes.
Grapes
Provide the juicy, fresh fruit centre under the sugar coating.

The step that matters

Whip the egg white until stiff. Stiff, well-whipped egg white traps air and holds its shape, so it coats the grapes evenly and carries the sugar. Underwhipped white runs off and leaves bare patches.

Swap the grape

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Grapethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar. 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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