Why it works: Sugar and rose are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,584 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Rose Lozenges
Ingredients
Directions
Make the paste
Dissolve ½ pound of gum arabic in 1 cup of water.
Sift crushed loaf sugar over a marble slab.
Make a cavity in the center of the slab.
Pour in the dissolved gum to make a thick paste.
Add essence of roses and ground cochineal for flavor and color.
Shape and dry
Roll out the paste to about ½ inch thickness.
Dust the surface with starch powder and caster sugar.
Smooth the surface with your palm.
Cut into lozenge-shaped pieces.
Place the pieces on trays to dry.
Store the lozenges in boxes and use as needed.
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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Sugar + rosetop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,584 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
- Gum arabic
- Forms the binding base that turns the dissolved mixture into a thick, shapeable paste.
- Crushed loaf sugar
- Provides sweetness and the bulk of the sugar base for the lozenges.
- Essence of roses
- Adds the rose aroma that defines the flavor of the lozenges.
- Ground cochineal
- Gives the lozenges their red colour.
- Starch powder
- Dusting prevents the paste from sticking to the surface and tools while rolling and cutting.
The step that matters
Pour in the dissolved gum to make a thick paste. The gum must be added gradually to the sugar in the cavity so the mixture thickens evenly into a workable paste rather than becoming lumpy or too wet to roll and cut cleanly.
“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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