Name: Chocolate Icing
Ingredients: 2 egg whites; 1½ cups powdered sugar; 6 tablespoons chocolate

Why it works: Sugar and chocolate are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,404 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chocolate Icing

Ingredients

2 egg whites
1½ cups powdered sugar
6 tablespoons chocolate

Directions

Make the icing

In a bowl, combine the egg whites and powdered sugar.
Add the chocolate and mix until smooth.

Frost

Use immediately to frost your cake.

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.

Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,404 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together122,807 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg + chocolatetop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,448 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-heptenal (green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites: Provide structure and body, helping the icing hold together and spread smoothly.
Powdered sugar: Adds sweetness and thickens the icing as it dissolves into the egg whites.
Chocolate: Provides flavor and color, and firms the icing as it cools.

“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.