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Sauce

Sherry Sauce

A sweet sauce made by boiling cream, sugar, and butter, then adding sherry and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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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 ↓

Sherry Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, boil the cream with the sugar and butter.

  2. Once boiling, add the sherry and grated nutmeg.

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. Cream + buttertop 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. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the sauce body as it dissolves into the cream.
Cream
Provides richness and a smooth, creamy texture as the base of the sauce.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a silky mouthfeel in the finished sauce.
Sherry
Contributes acidity and a distinct wine flavor that balances the sweetness.

The step that matters

Adding the sherry after boiling. Alcohol evaporates more readily at high temperatures, so adding sherry to a vigorously boiling mixture can cause its flavor to fade and may make it taste harsh. Adding it once the boil is reached and then reducing heat helps keep its character in the sauce.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Macefits less well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, butter, sherry. 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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