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Custard Ice Cream

Custard ice cream made from cream or milk, sugar, cornstarch or rice flour, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Custard Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Sweeten the cream or milk with sugar and flavor to taste.

  2. Heat the mixture in a double boiler until it begins to boil.

  3. Mix cornstarch or rice flour with a little milk until smooth. Stir the mixture into the boiling mixture.

  4. Boil for a few minutes.

  5. Remove from heat.

  6. Gradually stir in the beaten eggs until well combined.

Cool and freeze

  1. Let the mixture cool completely.

  2. Freeze it as ice cream.

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. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Cream + ricetop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  4. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Sugar + ricetop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Cream or rich milk
Provides fat and richness, giving the ice cream a smooth, creamy mouthfeel.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer when frozen.
Cornstarch or rice flour
Thickens the custard base so it holds body and resists icy texture.
Eggs
Add structure and richness as they set gently, thickening the custard.

The step that matters

Gradually stir in the beaten eggs. Adding hot liquid to eggs too quickly, or overheating them, can scramble the eggs and leave lumps. Adding them gradually while stirring tempers them so the custard stays smooth and thickens evenly.

“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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