Why it works: Syrup and sugar match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Water Ices
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the syrup
Boil 1 quart of water with 3 pounds of sugar.
Whisk in ½ egg white for 10 minutes to make clarified sugar.
Mix the juices of ripe fruits with syrup.
Test the sweetness with a saccharometer.
Freeze
Put the mixture into an ice pot.
Surround the ice pot with crushed ice mixed with coarse sea salt and a little saltpetre.
Work the freezer rapidly for 10 minutes.
Scrape the sides with an ice spatter.
Continue until the mixture is stiff and smooth.
Mould and serve
Transfer the mixture to a mold.
Leave the mold in ice until serving.
Dip the mold in cold water for a minute. Wipe dry.
Remove the ice onto a dish.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
-
Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,842 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
-
Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Syrup + eggtop 32% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,995 recipes
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sugar
- Dissolved in water to make the syrup, providing sweetness and softening the frozen texture.
- Ripe fruit juices
- Supply the main flavour and acidity of the water ice.
- Egg white
- Whisked into the boiling syrup to clarify it, lifting impurities so the ice is clearer.
- Crushed ice with coarse sea salt
- Salt lowers the ice's temperature, so the surrounding freezing mixture chills the custard base.
The step that matters
Continue scraping until stiff and smooth. Scraping the frozen edges back into the mixture breaks up ice crystals. Stopping early leaves a coarse, grainy texture, while over-churning can make it dense.
“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.
More water ice recipes
You might also like
Oranges in Syrup9 recipes
Syrup Sauce6 recipes
White Cake431 recipes
Pound Cake373 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.