Why it works: Butter and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Mocha Filling
Ingredients
Directions
Work the butter until soft.
Cream the butter with the powdered sugar until the sugar cannot be tasted.
Add the well-beaten yolks of the eggs gradually.
Slowly stir in the strong coffee to prevent curdling.
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 + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + coffeetop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,344 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Butter + coffeetop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
- Creamed with sugar to form the rich, smooth body of the filling.
- Powdered sugar
- Dissolves into the creamed butter to add sweetness and a fine, smooth texture.
- Egg yolks
- Emulsify with the butter and add richness and body to the filling.
- Strong coffee
- Adds liquid and coffee flavor; added slowly so the mixture does not curdle.
The step that matters
Adding the coffee slowly. Liquid added too fast to a butter and egg mixture can break the emulsion and make it curdle. Adding it gradually, with stirring, helps the fat and liquid stay combined into a smooth filling.
“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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