Why it works: Sugar and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
To Clarify Sugar
Ingredients
Directions
In a saucepan, combine 1 pound of sugar with 1 cup of water.
Beat the egg and add it to the cold syrup.
Bring the mixture to a boil.
If necessary, add a small amount of water while boiling.
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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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sugar
- Dissolves into the water to form the syrup, providing sweetness and the body of the finished liquid.
- Egg
- Proteins coagulate as the mixture heats, trapping impurities so they can be skimmed off.
The step that matters
Adding the egg to the cold syrup. The egg must be beaten and fully mixed into the cold syrup before heating. As the mixture warms, the egg proteins set and gather impurities, so an uneven mix leaves some impurities unclarified in the finished syrup.
“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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