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Dessert

Frozen Fruit Custard

A chilled custard made with milk, cream, eggs, sugar, and fruit, set in a mold and frozen.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Frozen Fruit Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the egg yolks and sugar together until well combined.

  2. Heat the milk almost to boiling, then gradually add it to the egg mixture.

  3. Return the mixture to the heat and stir constantly until it slightly thickens, being careful not to curdle.

Freeze

  1. When the custard is partly frozen, stir in the whipped cream and mix for a few more minutes.

  2. Gently fold in the fruit, then pour the mixture into a mold.

  3. Place the mold in a fresh mixture of ice and salt to freeze.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Milk + peachtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together781 recipes

    Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).

  3. Sugar + peachtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,308 recipes

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

  4. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness as they set gently with heat.
Heavy cream
Adds fat and a smooth, light texture once whipped and folded in.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and lowers the freezing point, keeping it softer.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, thickened by the egg yolks.
Peaches
Add fruit flavor and moisture to the frozen dessert.

The step that matters

Return the mixture to the heat and stir constantly until it slightly thickens. Egg yolks begin to set around 160°F and can curdle if overheated or left unstirred. Constant stirring over gentle heat keeps the custard smooth and thickened.

Swap the peach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, cream, egg, sugar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Raspberryfits about as well
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, cream, egg, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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