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Dessert

Fig Bisque

A sweet dessert made from figs, sugar syrup, and egg white.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and fig are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,241 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Fig Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Boil the light brown sugar, granulated sugar, and water until it reaches the soft ball stage.

Assemble and shape

  1. Stir the syrup into the beaten egg white and beat until nearly thick.

  2. Quickly stir in the chopped figs.

  3. Drop spoonfuls onto waxed paper using a teaspoon.

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 + figtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,241 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Egg + figtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,406 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Granulated sugar
Sweetens the bisque and helps the boiled syrup set firm when cooled.
Light brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses note, and helps the syrup hold its body.
Egg white
Beaten with the hot syrup to form a light, airy structure that holds the figs.
Chopped figs
Provide fruit flavor, sweetness, and soft texture throughout the candy.

The step that matters

Stir the syrup into the beaten egg white and beat until nearly thick. The hot syrup must be added to the egg white in a steady stream while beating so it cooks and stabilizes the foam. Beating too long or letting the mixture set before the figs are added makes it hard to drop cleanly.

Swap the fig

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. 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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