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Cream Puffs

Cream puffs are choux pastry filled with custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Cream Puffs

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the choux dough

  1. In a saucepan, combine ½ pint of water and 2 ounces of butter over medium heat.

  2. Add 4 ounces of flour quickly and stir until a soft, smooth dough forms.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

  4. Beat in 1 egg. Add another egg. Beat until mixed.

  5. Repeat adding eggs and beating until all 4 eggs incorporated.

Bake the puffs

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto a lightly greased baking pan.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 45 minutes.

Make the custard

  1. To make the custard, mix 1 tablespoon of flour with a little cold milk.

  2. Add this mixture to 4 pints of hot milk and stir.

  3. Beat the yolks of 3 eggs with 3 tablespoons of sugar and add to the milk mixture.

  4. Cook briefly. Remove from heat.

  5. Stir in 1 teaspoon of vanilla.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Eggs
Bind the dough and add structure and richness as the puffs set.
All-purpose flour
Forms the starch base of the dough and thickens the custard.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the dough, helping it stay tender.
Hot milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard.

The step that matters

Cooking the dough before adding eggs. The flour must be cooked in the hot water and butter so its starch gelatinises, and the dough must cool slightly before eggs are beaten in, otherwise the eggs scramble and the puffs cannot rise properly.

Swap the vanilla

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

  1. Vanillathe original
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Figfits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, egg, milk, 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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