Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Foam Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
In a saucepan, combine sugar, butter, and flour.
Place over heat and stir in boiling water.
Add baking soda and flavor to taste.
Stir until well combined and heated through.
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.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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 body to the sauce.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel.
- Flour
- Thickens the sauce as it heats with the butter and sugar.
- Baking soda
- Releases gas in the hot mixture, creating the foamy, airy texture.
The step that matters
Add baking soda and flavor to taste.. Baking soda releases gas when it reacts in the hot mixture, which is what makes the sauce foam. Adding it while the sauce is hot and stirring it in well gives an even foam without clumps of undissolved soda.
“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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