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Dessert

Sherry Sauce

A sweet sauce made with butter, powdered sugar, and sherry, simmered over boiling water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sherry are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,505 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Sherry Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cream the butter and powdered sugar together.

  2. Place the bowl over boiling water and stir for 5 minutes.

  3. Add the sherry and serve.

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + sherrytop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,141 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy body to the sauce.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the sauce and dissolves smoothly into the creamed butter.
Sherry
Adds acidity and aroma that brighten the sweetness.

The step that matters

Stirring over boiling water. Heat must be gentle and the bowl must not touch the water, so the butter and sugar warm and blend without separating or scorching. Too much heat can cause the butter to split.

“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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