Why it works: Sugar and peppermint are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 29% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,082 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓
Peppermint Drops
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
In a saucepan, combine sugar and boiling water.
Boil for 8 minutes without stirring.
Flavour and shape
Remove from heat and add oil of peppermint.
Beat with a spoon for about 5 minutes until the mixture is white and thick.
Drop onto buttered paper as soon as possible.
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.
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Sugar + pepperminttop 29% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,082 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sugar
- Forms the candy base and, once cooked and cooled, sets into a firm, brittle texture.
- Oil of peppermint
- Provides the main flavour of the drops.
The step that matters
Beating until white and thick. Beating cools the cooked sugar and encourages fine sugar crystals to form, which turns the syrup opaque and thick enough to hold its shape when dropped. Dropping it too late, after it has set, can leave the drops hard to shape.
“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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