Name: Common Sweet Sauce
Ingredients: 1 pint water; 1 tablespoon corn-starch or flour; 1 cup sugar; 1 tablespoon vinegar; 1 piece butter (about the size of a small egg); 1 tablespoon vanilla or lemon extract

Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Common Sweet Sauce

Ingredients

1 pint water
1 tablespoon corn-starch or flour
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon vinegar
1 piece butter (about the size of a small egg)
1 tablespoon vanilla or lemon extract

Directions

Make the sauce

Stir a paste of corn‑starch or flour with a little cold water into the pot of water.
Add sugar and vinegar.
Cook for 3 minutes.
Remove from heat and add butter.

Finish

Once cool, flavor with vanilla or lemon extract.

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.

Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together35,032 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,943 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,345 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Butter + vanillatop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,050 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

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