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Treacle Toffee

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Peppermint and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,583 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Treacle Toffee

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, melt butter over medium heat.

  2. Add treacle and let it boil gently.

  3. Test by dropping a small portion into cold water; it should break between your teeth.

  4. Once ready, remove from heat immediately to avoid burning.

  5. Pour onto a buttered dish and let cool.

  6. Once cool, roll into sticks and wrap in clean white paper.

  7. If desired, flavor with peppermint, almond, lemon, or add a pinch of cayenne pepper.

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. Peppermint + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,583 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Peppermint + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,517 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  4. Almond + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

Swap the peppermint

The recipe marks peppermint as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, almond, lemon, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Peppermintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, almond, lemon, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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