Skip to main content
Dessert

Old-fashioned Molasses Candy

A candy made from molasses, sugar, butter, chocolate, and peanuts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Chocolate and peanut are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,279 recipes. Both carry 2-ethyl-3,6-dimethylpyrazine, which smells roasted, nutty. The science ↓

Old-fashioned Molasses Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Make the candy

  1. In a large pot, combine molasses, sugar, and butter.

  2. Boil the mixture until it hardens when dropped into cold water.

Finish and set

  1. Remove from heat and stir in chocolate and peanuts.

  2. Pour the mixture into shallow pans to cool.

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. Chocolate + peanuttop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-ethyl-3,6-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  2. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Butter + peanuttop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,754 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  5. Butter + chocolatetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,543 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Molasses
Provides the dark color, rich flavor, and chewy body of the candy.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and, once boiled, helps the candy set firm as it cools.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the texture and gives a smoother, less brittle bite.
Chocolate
Adds bittersweet flavor and melts into the hot mixture for richness.
Peanuts
Add crunch and a roasted, nutty flavor to the chewy candy.

The step that matters

Boil until it hardens in cold water. Sugar candy sets according to how much water has boiled off. Boiling too little leaves it soft and sticky, while boiling too long makes it hard and brittle. The cold-water test checks the concentration before removing from heat.

Swap the peanut

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pecansfits better
  3. Walnutfits about as well
  4. Peanutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, sugar, egg, butter, chocolate. 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.

More molasses candy recipes

Peanut 4 See all 242 →

You might also like

Chocolate CreamChocolate Cream171 recipesMolasses CookiesMolasses Cookies96 recipesMolasses CakeMolasses Cake90 recipesPeanut CandyPeanut Candy82 recipes