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Maple Cream Candy

A sweet confection made from maple syrup, cream, butter, and nuts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Maple Cream Candy

Why it works: Cream and butter 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 ↓

Maple Cream Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Make the candy

  1. Cook the maple syrup until it forms a heavy thread when dipped on a spoon.

  2. Add the cream and butter, then cook for 10 to 15 minutes until it grains readily when stirred in a saucer.

  3. Remove from heat and beat in a cool place until it thickens.

  4. Add the chopped nuts and continue beating until it begins to grain.

Set and cut

  1. Pour into a buttered shallow pan and crease into squares.

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.

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.

  1. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Maple syrup + butternuttop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  3. Maple syrup + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,084 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Maple syrup + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together607 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Cream + butternuttop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

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

What each ingredient does

Maple syrup
Provides the main sweetness and flavor, and its sugar crystallizes into the candy's grainy texture.
Rich cream
Adds fat and moisture, producing a softer, creamier candy than syrup alone.
Butter
Adds richness and smoothness to the candy's texture.
Butternut meats
Adds crunch and a toasted nutty flavor to the soft candy.

The step that matters

Beating until it begins to grain. Beating after the cooked syrup has cooled lets fine sugar crystals form, giving a creamy texture. Beating too early or too long can make the candy set too hard or grainy before it is poured.

Swap the butternut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (maple syrup, cream, butter):

  1. Pecansfits better
  2. Almondfits better
  3. Walnutfits better
  4. Butternutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against maple syrup, cream, butter. 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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