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Maple Fudge

Maple fudge is a sweet confection made with walnuts, brown sugar, milk, butter, and maple syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Maple Fudge

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Maple Fudge

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine walnuts, brown sugar, milk, butter, and maple syrup in a saucepan.

  2. Cook over medium heat until the mixture hardens when dropped in water.

  3. Remove from heat, add walnuts, and beat until thick.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Walnut + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Walnut + maple syruptop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together309 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  4. Walnut + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,236 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  5. Sugar + maple syruptop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,252 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Brown sugar
Provides sweetness and, as it cooks with milk, builds the caramel flavour and firm texture of the fudge.
Milk
Supplies moisture and dissolves the sugar, forming the base that cooks down into a creamy fudge.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rich mouthfeel and helps keep the fudge tender.
Maple syrup
Adds maple aroma and extra sweetness, along with some moisture.
Walnuts
Add crunch and nutty flavour that contrasts with the smooth fudge.

The step that matters

Cook until the mixture hardens when dropped in water. Cooking drives off water and concentrates the sugar until it reaches the right point. Too little cooking leaves fudge soft and runny, while too much makes it hard and grainy. The water test is a practical way to judge that point.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, milk, egg, butter, maple syrup):

  1. Pecansfits better
  2. Almondfits about as well
  3. Walnutthe original
  4. Nutsfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, egg, butter, maple syrup. 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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