Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Barley Sugar
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
In a clean pan, combine the sugar and boiling water.
Melt slowly over low heat, stirring frequently until it boils.
Boil and test
Once boiling, stop stirring and add the cream of tartar.
Boil without a lid until it sets; test by dropping a little into cold water.
If it is brittle, pour it onto an oiled dish.
Shape and finish
Use scissors to clip pieces from the outer edge, twist them, and lay them on a flat board.
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 + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Loaf sugar
- Forms the base of the candy, setting into a hard, glassy sweet mass as it cools.
- Cream of tartar
- Adds acidity that helps prevent sugar crystals from forming, keeping the candy smooth and clear.
The step that matters
Boil without a lid until it sets. Sugar syrup must reach the correct high temperature to harden when cooled. Stirring after boiling can trigger crystallisation, and a lid traps steam that can drip back and make the mixture grainy, so the cook should test it in cold water as instructed.
“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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