Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Cream Candy
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the syrup
Combine the sugar, water, vinegar, butter, and cream of tartar in a saucepan.
Boil the mixture for 20 minutes without stirring.
Remove from heat.
Pull the candy
Pull the candy when it cools.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Butter + walnuttop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,832 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
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Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,806 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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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
- Lump sugar
- Forms the candy's body and provides its sweetness once the syrup is boiled and set.
- Cream of tartar
- An acid that helps keep the sugar from recrystallizing too coarsely, giving a smoother texture.
- Vinegar
- An acid that partly breaks down sugar, helping the candy stay smooth and tender.
- Butter
- Adds fat that softens the candy's texture and gives it a richer flavor.
The step that matters
Pull the candy when it cools. Pulling while the candy cools incorporates air and encourages fine crystals, which makes it lighter and paler. Pulling too early or too late changes the texture.
Swap the walnut
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, vinegar, butter, cream):
- Almondfits better
- Pistachiofits about as well
- Peanutfits about as well
- Walnutthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, butter, 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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