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Dessert

Very Superior Whipped Syllabubs

A chilled dessert of sugar, lemon, sherry, brandy, and cream whisked into a frothy syllabub.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sherry and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,209 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Very Superior Whipped Syllabubs

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Weigh the sugar and rasp the rinds of the lemons into it.

  2. Pound or roll the mixture to a powder and place it in a bowl.

  3. Add the strained lemon juice, sherry, and brandy to the bowl.

  4. Stir until the sugar is dissolved, then add the cream.

Whisk and chill

  1. Whisk the mixture well and remove the froth as it rises.

  2. Pour the syllabub into glasses and refrigerate.

  3. Prepare 24 hours in advance for best flavor.

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. Sherry + brandytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Brandy + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,635 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Lemon + sherrytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,273 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Fine sugar
Sweetens the drink and helps draw oils from the lemon rind.
Lemons
Provide acidity and aroma from the juice and rind.
Sherry
Adds body and a wine flavor to the mixture.
Brandy
Adds alcohol strength and warm flavor.
Cream
Whisks into a light, airy froth that gives the syllabub its texture.

The step that matters

Whisk the mixture well and remove the froth as it rises. Cream whisked with acidic, alcoholic liquid thickens gradually, so whisking must be steady and the froth skimmed as it forms, leaving a smooth liquid to chill and set.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, sherry, brandy, cream):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Strawberryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, sherry, brandy, cream. 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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