Name: Fresh Currant Ice Cream
Ingredients: 1 pint currants; 5 ounces powdered sugar; 1 pint cream

Why it works: Sugar and cream 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 ↓

Fresh Currant Ice Cream

Ingredients

1 pint currants
5 ounces powdered sugar
1 pint cream

Directions

Pass the currants through a sieve.
Mix the sieved currants with powdered sugar and cream.
Freeze the mixture until solid.

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.

Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Currant + sugartop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together12,256 recipes
Currant + creamtop 32% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,829 recipes

Currant and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,256 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

Currants: Provide the tart, fruity flavour and colour of the ice cream.
Powdered sugar: Sweetens the mixture and dissolves easily into the cold cream.
Cream: Adds fat and richness, giving the ice cream a smooth, creamy texture.