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Dessert

Cream Candies

A confection made by boiling sugar and water, then cooling, kneading, and coating with chocolate and other ingredients.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and fig match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Cream Candies

Ingredients

Directions

Make the fondant

  1. Combine sugar, cold water, and cream of tartar in a kettle.

  2. Boil rapidly without stirring for about 10 minutes.

  3. Test the syrup by dipping fingers in cold water and rolling a drop between them; if it forms a creamy ball, it is done.

  4. Remove from heat and let it cool until lukewarm.

  5. Stir with a wooden paddle until creamy and begins to harden.

  6. Knead with your hands until smooth and creamy.

  7. Roll a piece of fondant into a cylindrical shape.

  8. Cut into 1-inch pieces and shape into rounds.

  9. Place on paraffin paper to harden.

Coat and finish

  1. Melt Baker's chocolate over a double boiler.

  2. Add a piece of paraffin the size of a walnut, half as much butter, and a few drops of vanilla. Mix thoroughly.

  3. Dip the fondant pieces in the chocolate mixture.

  4. Place on paraffin paper to harden.

  5. Cut figs in half.

  6. Dip in melted fondant.

  7. Lay on wax paper to harden.

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. Vanilla + figtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together324 recipes

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

  2. Walnut + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together993 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Fig + almondtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Vanilla + almondtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Fig + walnuttop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together373 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Granulated sugar
Forms the syrup that sets into the creamy fondant when worked.
Cream of tartar
Acid that helps prevent sugar crystals from growing too large, keeping the fondant smooth.
Baker's chocolate
Forms the coating that hardens around the fondant pieces.
Paraffin
Adds gloss and firmness to the chocolate coating so it sets hard.
Figs
Filling fruit that is dipped in fondant to make creamed figs.

The step that matters

Boil without stirring, then test the syrup before cooling. Stirring during boiling can trigger sugar crystals that turn the fondant grainy. Testing with cold water shows when the syrup has reached the right concentration to set creamy; stopping too early leaves it soft and stopping late makes it hard.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream, chocolate, butter, vanilla, fig, almond):

  1. Hazelnutfits better
  2. Pistachiofits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, chocolate, butter, vanilla, fig, almond. 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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