Why it works: Sugar and syrup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Home-made Marshmallows
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the gelatine and syrup
Soak the gelatine in 8 tablespoons of cold water.
Heat 2 cups of sugar in 8 tablespoons of water until dissolved.
Add the soaked gelatine to the syrup and let it stand until partially cool.
Whip and set
Add salt and flavoring, then beat with a whisk until too stiff to beat any longer.
Beat with a spoon until soft enough to settle into a sheet.
Pour the mixture into a pan dusted with powdered sugar, about 2 inches deep.
Let it cool, then turn it out onto a breadboard covered with powdered sugar.
Cut and coat
Cut into cubes and roll in powdered sugar.
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 + syruptop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,842 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Gelatine
- Forms the elastic gel structure that holds the marshmallow's airy foam together as it sets.
- Granulated sugar
- Provides sweetness and, dissolved into syrup, gives the body that helps the mixture set firm.
The step that matters
Beating until the mixture holds its shape. Beating incorporates air into the warm gelatine-sugar syrup to form the foam. Beating too little leaves it runny and unable to set, while beating past the stiff stage makes it hard to pour into the pan.
“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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