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Dessert

Cocoanut Fudge

A sweet treat made from sugar, cream, butter, and desiccated coconut, boiled and cooled into a thick fudge.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Cocoanut Fudge

Ingredients

Directions

Make the fudge

  1. In a granite saucepan, combine sugar, cream (or milk), and butter.

  2. Stir constantly and boil for 5 minutes after reaching a boil.

  3. Remove from heat and add desiccated coconut.

  4. Beat constantly until the mixture is cold and thick.

Set and cut

  1. Pour into a buttered tin to a depth of ½ inch.

  2. Once cold, mark 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.

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. Butter + coconuttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cream + coconuttop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,223 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Granulated sugar
Provides sweetness and, as it dissolves and cooks, forms the body of the fudge.
Cream or milk
Adds fat and moisture, giving the fudge a softer, creamier texture.
Butter
Adds fat for smoothness and richness in the finished fudge.
Desiccated coconut
Adds texture and flavour, stirred in off the heat so it stays intact.

The step that matters

Beat constantly until cold and thick. Beating while the sugar syrup cools forms many tiny sugar crystals, which gives fudge a smooth, fine texture. If it is left unbeaten, larger crystals form and the fudge turns grainy.

Swap the coconut

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits about as well
  3. Coconutthe original
  4. Raspberryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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