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Sauce

Sherry Wine Sauce

A sauce made from sugar, butter, sherry wine, and eggs, beaten and heated until scalded.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and wine are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,645 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Sherry Wine Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a mixing bowl, beat together the sugar, butter, sherry wine, and eggs for 30 minutes.

  2. Heat the mixture in a saucepan until it is scalded, but do not let it boil.

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. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Butter + eggtop 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

Eggs
Bind the mixture and thicken it as it heats, giving the sauce body.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the sauce.
Fine white sugar
Sweetens the sauce and helps give it a smooth, glossy texture.
Sherry wine
Adds acidity and a distinctive nutty, aromatic flavor.

The step that matters

Heat until scalded, not boiling. Eggs can curdle or scramble if overheated, so the mixture should be heated gently until steaming and just scalded. Boiling risks a grainy texture and a thin, broken sauce.

“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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