Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Cream Candy
Ingredients
Directions
Make the candy
In a saucepan, combine sugar, vinegar, cream of tartar, and water.
Boil the mixture until it hardens when dropped into cold water.
Remove from heat and stir in lemon extract.
Cool and cut
Pour the mixture into a buttered pan to cool.
Once cool, pull the candy and cut it into pieces.
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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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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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 + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Vinegar + lemontop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,334 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Vinegar + creamtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,064 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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
- Granulated sugar
- Forms the candy's sweet, solid body as it cooks and hardens.
- Vinegar
- Acidity helps keep the sugar from recrystallizing, giving a smoother texture.
- Cream of tartar
- Another acid that helps prevent sugar crystals from forming, keeping the candy smooth.
The step that matters
Boil until it hardens in cold water. Sugar syrup must reach the right concentration to set firm when cooled. Stopping too early leaves the candy sticky, while going too far makes it brittle.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, vinegar, cream):
- Vanillafits better
- Strawberryfits better
- Raspberryfits better
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, 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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