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Sauce

Creamy Sauce

A sweet sauce made with powdered sugar, butter, cream or milk, and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Creamy Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Beat the butter until creamy.

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

  3. Add the wine, then the cream a little at a time.

  4. Once smooth, place the bowl in a basin of hot water for 1-2 minutes, stirring constantly.

  5. Do not leave it in the hot water long enough to melt the sugar.

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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cream + winetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,887 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Provides fat and a creamy base that carries the sugar and liquids.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness and body, dissolving smoothly into the creamed butter.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and softens the sauce to a smooth, pourable texture.
Wine
Contributes flavour and acidity that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Warming over hot water. Sugar melts and can turn grainy or syrupy if overheated. Brief, constant stirring over hot water warms the sauce gently while keeping the sugar dissolved and the texture smooth.

“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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