Why it works: Ginger and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,054 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Syrup of Ginger
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Boil the ginger in the water until its strength is extracted.
Add the loaf sugar and boil until it becomes a thick syrup.
Skim off the scum until the syrup is clear.
Bottle
When cold, bottle it.
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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Ginger + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together14,054 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ginger and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 14,054 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
- Ginger
- Gives the syrup its flavour and aroma as it infuses into the water.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the syrup and thickens it as boiling reduces the water.
The step that matters
Boil the sugar to a thick syrup. Boiling evaporates water and concentrates the sugar, so the syrup thickens. Stopping too early leaves it thin and prone to spoiling, while boiling too long can make it overly stiff or crystallise as it cools.
“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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