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Boiled Frosting

A frothy icing made by boiling powdered sugar with water, then folding in beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Boiled Frosting

Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Boiled Frosting

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. Combine powdered sugar and water in a saucepan.

  2. Let it stand until dissolved.

  3. Boil the mixture until it is clear and forms threads when dripped from a spoon.

Make the frosting

  1. Beat the egg whites in a separate bowl until stiff.

  2. When the syrup is lukewarm, pour it into the bowl with the egg whites and beat well for 30 minutes.

  3. Flavor the frosting with vanilla, rose-water, or lemon juice to taste.

Apply to the cake

  1. Lightly rub the cake with flour before applying the icing.

  2. Apply the first coat of frosting to the cake immediately after mixing.

  3. Continue to beat the remaining frosting while the first coat dries, especially if the cake is near a warm fire.

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.

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.

  1. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  3. Egg + vanillatop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together27,347 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Powdered sugar
Forms the sweet syrup that becomes the frosting's body and sweetness.
Egg whites
Beaten to stiff foam, they give the frosting its light, airy structure.
Water
Dissolves the powdered sugar into the syrup that is boiled to thread stage.

The step that matters

Boiling the syrup to the thread stage. Boil until the syrup is clear and forms threads from a spoon. Undercooked syrup stays runny and will not set into a stable frosting, while overcooked syrup turns stiff and grainy when beaten into the egg whites.

“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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