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Dessert

Yellow Sauce for Puddings

A butter and sugar-based sauce flavored with sherry, used for puddings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sherry are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,505 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Yellow Sauce for Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Cream the butter in a bowl.

  2. Gradually add the powdered sugar and mix until light.

  3. Add the egg yolks one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

  5. Flavor with sherry to taste.

Heat and serve

  1. Place the bowl in a pan of boiling water to heat.

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. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  5. Sugar + sherrytop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,141 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
Creams with the sugar to form a light, smooth base for the sauce.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the sauce and helps the creamed butter become light and airy.
Egg yolks
Enrich the sauce and thicken it as it gently heats, giving a custard-like body.
Egg whites
Folded in whipped to lighten the sauce and add airiness to its texture.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a mellow flavor to the sauce.

The step that matters

Place the bowl in a pan of boiling water to heat.. Egg yolks thicken as they warm, but they can scramble if overheated. Gentle heat from simmering water, rather than direct high heat, lets the sauce thicken smoothly without curdling.

“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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