Why it works: Sugar and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Clarified Sugar or Water Ices
Ingredients
Directions
Make the syrup
Dissolve the sugar in the water in a saucepan.
Beat and stir in half the egg white.
Bring the mixture to a boil and boil for 10 minutes, skimming frequently.
Strain and cool
Strain the mixture through a fine sieve and let it cool.
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 + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
- Sugar
- Dissolves into the water to form a sweet syrup that sets the body of the ice.
- Egg white
- Coagulates as it heats, trapping impurities so they can be skimmed off for a clearer result.
The step that matters
Boiling with the egg white and skimming. As the mixture heats, the egg white proteins set and bind impurities and cloudy particles to the surface. Skimming them off during the 10-minute boil keeps the syrup clear. Skimming too little leaves the ice cloudy.
“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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