Skip to main content
Dessert

Cream

A dairy cream made by boiling milk, protein, water, fat, milk sugar, and sugar, then cooling and adding lime water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Cream

Why it works: Milk and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Cream

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 100°F (38°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Boil or steam the milk, protein, water, fat, milk sugar, and sugar to destroy micro-organisms.

  2. Allow the mixture to cool to 100°F (38°C).

Finish

  1. Add the lime water and mix well.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  2. Milk + limetop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together700 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Sugar + limetop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,332 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Milk
Provides the liquid base and moisture for the cream.
Protein
Adds body and structure to the cream as it sets.
Fat
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy mouthfeel.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the flavor.

The step that matters

Boil or steam the mixture. Heating the milk, protein, water, fat, milk sugar, and sugar thoroughly destroys micro-organisms that could spoil the cream or make it unsafe. Skipping or shortening this heat treatment leaves the mixture at risk.

Swap the lime

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Limethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against 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.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes