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Molasses, Candy

A hard candy made from molasses, sugar, vinegar, butter, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Molasses and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Molasses, Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Make the candy

  1. In a saucepan, combine molasses, sugar, vinegar, and butter.

  2. Boil the mixture without stirring until it hardens when dropped in cold water.

  3. Remove from heat and stir in the baking soda.

Pour and shape

  1. Pour the mixture onto buttered tins.

  2. Once cool, pull the candy and cut it into sticks.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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

Molasses
Gives the candy its dark color, rich flavor, and chewy moisture.
Sugar
Provides sweetness and the sugar base that sets into a firm candy.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that helps prevent the sugar from crystallizing into grains.
Butter
Adds fat that softens the texture and keeps the candy from being brittle.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid to add bubbles that lighten the candy's texture.

The step that matters

Boil without stirring until it hardens in cold water. Stirring during boiling can trigger sugar crystals, making the candy grainy. Boiling until a drop hardens in cold water shows the sugar has reached the concentration that sets firm, so the candy neither stays sticky nor turns brittle.

“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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