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Dessert

Vanilla Sauce

A sweet sauce made with butter, sugar, corn starch, water, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Vanilla Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Cream the butter in a bowl.

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

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, mix the corn starch with cold water until smooth.

  2. Pour in the boiling water and cook over heat until clear.

Combine and serve

  1. At serving time, pour the hot mixture into the butter and sugar mixture.

  2. Stir until well combined, then add the vanilla and serve immediately.

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. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,943 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Butter + corntop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

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

  4. Butter + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy mouthfeel to the sauce.
Sugar
Sweetens the sauce and helps the butter beat into a light, creamy base.
Corn starch
Thickens the boiling water into a glossy sauce as its starch swells and sets when heated.

The step that matters

Pour in the boiling water and cook over heat until clear. Cornstarch only thickens fully once its starch granules swell and gelatinize in boiling liquid. Stopping early leaves the sauce thin and starchy-tasting, so cook until it turns clear and thick.

“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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