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Dessert

Frosting

A light, stiff frosting made from beaten egg whites, powdered sugar, cornstarch, gum Arabic, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Frosting

frosts one small cake

Ingredients

Directions

Make the frosting

  1. Beat the egg whites to a stiff froth.

  2. Sift in the powdered sugar, cornstarch, and gum Arabic, stirring until firm.

  3. In a separate bowl, beat another egg white until it holds its shape, then add 5 heaping tablespoons of powdered sugar and 1 tablespoon of cornstarch.

  4. This will frost one small cake; flavor to taste.

Make the glaze

  1. For glazing, mix the beaten egg white with a little water in a saucepan and bring to a boil.

  2. Add a few drops of cold water, then stir in 1 cup of powdered sugar until it foams.

  3. Use the glaze immediately on cakes.

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 + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  2. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

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

Egg whites
Beaten into a stiff foam that gives the frosting its light, structured body.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness and bulk, and stiffens the foam as it dissolves into it.
Cornstarch
Stabilises the frosting so it holds its shape and resists weeping.
Gum arabic
Acts as a stabiliser that helps the frosting stay firm and glossy.

The step that matters

Sifting in the sugar while stirring. Adding powdered sugar gradually to the whipped whites keeps the foam stable. Dumping it in at once can deflate the air bubbles, leaving a runny frosting that will not hold its shape.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Datesfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar. 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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