Why it works: Sugar and egg 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 ↓
Clarified Sugar
Ingredients
Directions
Combine the sugar and 2 quarts water in a preserving pan over heat.
When the mixture is warm, add the beaten egg whites mixed with ½ pint water.
Boil and skim until clear, then strain through a fine bag.
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 + eggtop 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 whites
- Coagulate when heated, trapping impurities so they can be skimmed off, leaving the syrup clear.
- Loaf sugar
- Forms the syrup that is clarified; it is the base of the finished product.
The step that matters
Boil and skim until clear. Egg white proteins set as the syrup heats and carry impurities to the surface. Skimming them off as they form is what makes the sugar clear, so skimming should be thorough rather than rushed.
“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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