Skip to main content
Dessert

Caramel Sauce

A sweet sauce made from caramelized sugar, syrup, arrowroot, vanilla, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Caramel Sauce

Why it works: Arrowroot and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 242 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Caramel Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the caramel

  1. Brown the sugar in a copper saucepan.

  2. Add the syrup and boil gently for 10 minutes.

Thicken and finish

  1. Blend the arrowroot smoothly with a little cold cream.

  2. Stir the arrowroot mixture into the sauce and simmer for 3 to 4 minutes.

  3. Add vanilla essence to taste.

  4. Strain and use as required.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Arrowroot + vanillatop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together242 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Syrup + creamtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Loaf sugar
Browning in the pan builds the deep caramel colour and flavour.
Syrup
Adds sweetness and body, and keeps the sauce smooth and pourable.
Arrowroot
Starch that thickens the sauce as it heats and gives it a glossy set.
Cream
Adds richness and a softer, smoother mouthfeel to the finished sauce.

The step that matters

Blend the arrowroot smoothly with cold cream. Starch grains clump if they hit hot liquid undispersed. Mixing them with cold cream first lets them spread evenly, so the sauce thickens without lumps.

Swap the arrowroot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (syrup, sugar, vanilla, cream):

  1. Arrowrootthe original
  2. Sweet potatofits about as well
  3. Beetrootfits less well
  4. Capsicumfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against syrup, sugar, vanilla, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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 caramel sauce recipes

Chocolate 3 See all 98 →

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesArrowroot PuddingArrowroot Pudding46 recipesOranges in SyrupOranges in Syrup9 recipesSyrup SauceSyrup Sauce6 recipes