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Dessert

Brandy Sauce

A sweet glaze made with powdered sugar, butter, brandy, cinnamon, and mace.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,611 recipes. Both carry methyleugenol, which smells clove, spice. The science ↓

Brandy Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Warm the butter slightly.

  2. Work in the powdered sugar until it forms a rich cream.

  3. Add the brandy and spices, then beat hard.

Shape and set

  1. Shape the mixture by putting it into a mold that has been very wet with cold water.

  2. Set the mold in a cool place to harden.

  3. If it does not turn out readily, dip it for a second in hot water.

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. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Brandy + cinnamontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,199 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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
Provides sweetness and bulk, and with the butter forms the rich, firm cream.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the sugar bind into a smooth cream.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour and moistens the mixture.

The step that matters

Setting the mold in a cool place. The mixture hardens as the butter firms up in the cold, so it must be chilled long enough to hold its shape when unmolded. Wetting the mold with cold water helps the mixture release cleanly.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, brandy, cinnamon):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, brandy, cinnamon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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