Why it works: Coffee and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,344 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Coffee Syrup
Ingredients
Directions
Make the coffee base
Roast and grind the coffee.
Add the coffee to the water in a pot.
Bring to a boil, then remove from heat and cover for 10-15 minutes.
Strain the mixture.
If needed, add enough water to make 2 quarts.
Make the syrup
Add the sugar and keep warm until dissolved.
Skim off any foam and strain again.
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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Coffee + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,344 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Java coffee
- Provides the coffee flavor that defines the syrup.
- Sugar
- Provides sweetness and body, and helps the syrup keep.
- Water
- Extracts the coffee flavor and dissolves the sugar.
The step that matters
Bring to a boil, then remove from heat and cover for 10-15 minutes. Boiling extracts flavor quickly, but letting the coffee steep off the heat under a cover draws out flavor without the bitterness that prolonged boiling produces. Removing it from heat at the right moment keeps the extraction balanced.
“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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