Why it works: Sugar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Barley Sugar
Ingredients
Directions
Make the sugar
Boil the clarified sugar and lemon peel in a sugar pan until it reaches caramel height.
Prepare a marble slab by lightly oiling it.
Pour the sugar onto the slab in lengths according to the desired size of the sticks.
Shape and store
Twist the sugar sticks and let them cool completely.
Store the cooled sticks for later use.
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.
-
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked 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
- Clarified sugar
- Forms the glassy, hard candy base that sets as it cools.
The step that matters
Boiling to caramel height. The sugar must be cooked to the right temperature so it sets hard and glassy when cooled. Undercooked sugar stays sticky and soft, while overcooked sugar darkens and turns bitter.
“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.
More barley sugar recipes
You might also like
Lemon Cake228 recipes
Lemon Ice147 recipes
Lemon Sherbet103 recipes
Lemon Custard64 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.