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Dessert

Honey or Syrup Dressing

A sweet dressing made with honey or syrup, citrus juice, vinegar, onion, and oil, served with pancakes or rolled oats.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Honey and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,586 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Honey or Syrup Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Mix the juice of one lemon, orange, or grapefruit with ½ cup of honey or syrup.

  2. Serve with pancakes.

  3. In a saucepan, bring ½ cup of syrup and 1 tablespoon of vinegar to a boil.

  4. Add 1 finely chopped onion, remove from heat, and cool.

  5. Mix in desired amount of oil.

  6. Serve with pancakes or baked rolled oats.

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. Honey + vinegartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,586 recipes

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

  2. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Honey + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,707 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Lemon + oniontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,646 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Lemon + vinegartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,334 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Honey or table syrup
Adds sweetness and a thick, syrupy body to the dressing.
Citrus juice
Adds bright acidity that balances the sweetness of the syrup.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that brightens the flavor of the syrup.
Onion
Adds savory aroma and a mild background flavor.
Oil
Adds fat and a smoother, richer mouthfeel.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (honey, lemon, syrup, vinegar):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Arrowrootfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against honey, lemon, syrup, vinegar. 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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