Why it works: Butter and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 98,233 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓
Strawberry Sauce.
Ingredients
Directions
Make the sauce
Beat the butter until creamy.
Gradually add the powdered sugar and mix well.
Mash one strawberry and beat it into the mixture.
Add the second strawberry and continue beating until the sauce is a pretty pink.
Adjust and chill
If the sauce appears curdled, add a little more sugar.
Place the sauce on ice to harden.
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 + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Butter
- Provides fat that makes the sauce creamy and gives it body.
- Powdered sugar
- Sweetens the sauce and dissolves smoothly into the fat for a fine texture.
- Strawberries
- Add fruit flavor and the pink color.
The step that matters
Adding the sugar gradually. Butter is a fat that must be beaten into a smooth, stable mixture. Adding the sugar slowly lets it blend in evenly, while adding too much at once can break the mixture so it looks curdled.
“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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