Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Another Boiled Icing
Ingredients
Directions
Combine sugar and water in a saucepan and boil until clear without stirring.
Remove from heat and let it cool slightly.
Pour the syrup over the beaten egg white.
Beat the mixture well until it reaches a proper consistency.
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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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg white
- Whipped into foam, it gives the icing its light, airy body.
- White sugar
- Dissolved in water and boiled into syrup, it sets the icing's sweetness and firm structure.
The step that matters
Pouring the syrup over the egg white. The syrup must be cooled slightly first. If it is too hot it can cook the egg white unevenly, and if it is too cool it will not blend smoothly into the foam.
“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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