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Dessert

Oriental Fudge

A sweet confection made from sugar, milk, honey, and egg white, boiled to a hard ball stage and cut into cubes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and honey are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,336 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

Oriental Fudge

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. In a saucepan, combine sugar and milk. Boil for 2 minutes.

  2. Add honey and continue boiling until it reaches the soft ball stage.

Combine and set

  1. Pour half of the mixture over the stiffly beaten egg white.

  2. Return the other half to the heat and boil until it reaches the hard ball stage.

  3. Combine both mixtures and beat until it thickens.

  4. Pour into shallow pans and cut into cubes.

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. Milk + honeytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,336 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  2. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + honeytop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,932 recipes

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

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Provides sweetness and, as it boils, forms the firm structure of the fudge.
Milk
Adds moisture and milk solids that give the fudge a softer, creamier texture.
Strained honey
Adds sweetness and moisture and helps keep the fudge from turning grainy.
Egg white
Whipped to stiff foam, it traps air and gives the fudge a light, airy body.

The step that matters

Boiling to the soft ball and hard ball stages. These stages depend on the sugar concentration reaching set temperatures. Stopping too early leaves the fudge soft and runny, while boiling too long makes it hard and brittle.

“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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