Name: Mocha Frosting
Ingredients: 1 cup butter; 2 cups confectioners' sugar; Coffee extract (to taste)

Why it works: Sugar and coffee are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,344 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Mocha Frosting

Ingredients

1 cup butter
2 cups confectioners' sugar
Coffee extract (to taste)

Directions

In a bowl, beat the butter with a wooden spoon until creamy.
Gradually add the confectioners' sugar, mixing well.
Add coffee extract to tint and flavor as desired.

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.

Sugar + coffeetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,344 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Butter + coffeetop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,442 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter: Provides fat and body, giving the frosting a creamy, spreadable texture.
Confectioners' sugar: Sweetens and thickens the butter into a smooth, spreadable frosting.
Coffee extract: Adds coffee aroma and flavor, along with the color that makes it mocha.

“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.