Name: Candied Sweet Potatoes
Ingredients: medium-sized sweet potatoes; ½ cup syrup; 2 tablespoons butter; brown sugar

Why it works: Syrup and sugar 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 ↓

Candied Sweet Potatoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

medium-sized sweet potatoes
½ cup syrup
2 tablespoons butter
brown sugar

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Boil and cut the sweet potatoes in halves.
Lay the halves evenly in a braising pan.

Bake and serve

Baste with warmed syrup and butter.
Sprinkle lightly with brown sugar.
Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until brown.
Serve with the syrup.

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.

Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,842 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Sweet potato + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,151 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Sweet potato + buttertop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,491 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Sweet potato + syruptop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together59 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

Sweet potatoes: Form the main body of the dish and soften into a tender, moist interior when boiled and baked.
Syrup: Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the surface caramelize and turn glossy in the oven.
Butter: Adds richness and fat that helps the syrup coat the potatoes and promotes browning.
Brown sugar: Adds sweetness and molasses flavor, and caramelizes on the surface during baking.

The step that matters

Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until brown. Sugars in the syrup and brown sugar darken and caramelize only with sustained heat. Pulling the dish too early leaves it pale and under-glazed, while too long can scorch the sugars and make the glaze bitter.

“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.