Why it works: Orange and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,212 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Orange Syrup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the oranges
Wash and wipe the oranges well.
Roll the oranges on a platter until the oil starts to release.
Rub the oranges with sugar in your hands until all the oil is extracted, changing the sugar as needed.
Make the syrup
Squeeze out all the juice and strain it.
Combine the juice with the pound of sugar that has absorbed the oil.
Simmer gently on the back of the stove for 15 to 20 minutes.
If not perfectly clear, strain through a cloth.
Bottle
Reheat and pour into bottles, then cork and seal tightly.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19,212 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Orange and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
- Oranges
- Supply the juice and the aromatic oil that flavours the syrup.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the syrup and absorbs the orange oil from the peel, carrying its aroma into the juice.
The step that matters
Rubbing the oranges with sugar. Sugar draws the fragrant oil out of the peel's oil glands. If the rubbing is cut short, less oil is extracted and the syrup tastes weaker. Changing to fresh sugar as it becomes saturated keeps the oil transfer working.
“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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