Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Crystallized Fruit
Ingredients
Directions
Coat the fruit
Beat the egg white until frothy.
Dip the fruit in the egg white.
Roll the coated fruit in sifted white sugar.
Dry the fruit
Place the fruit in an open oven to dry slowly until white.
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.
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg white
- Forms a sticky coating that holds the sugar and dries into a crisp shell.
- White sugar
- Forms a sweet, crisp, white outer layer as the coating dries.
The step that matters
Drying slowly in the oven. Low, slow heat dries the egg white and sugar into a crisp, white shell. Too much heat or time can brown the sugar and make the coating sticky or scorched.
“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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