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Dessert

Walnut Ice Cream

A frozen dessert made from walnuts, milk, cream, sugar, eggs, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Walnut Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the eggs with 1 cup of sugar.

  2. Combine the eggs and milk in a double boiler, stirring constantly until the mixture thickens.

  3. Add the salt and let the mixture cool.

Finish and freeze

  1. Once cool, stir in the cream and walnut meats, then 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. Walnut + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,035 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Walnut + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,236 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  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

Eggs
Thicken the custard as they set over gentle heat, giving body and richness.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, which thickens into a smooth mixture.
Cream
Adds fat, which makes the frozen ice cream rich and smooth in texture.
Walnut meats
Provide the main nutty flavor and a slightly crunchy texture in the frozen dessert.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the richness of the eggs and cream.

The step that matters

Thickening the custard in the double boiler. Egg proteins set as they heat, so stirring constantly over gentle, indirect heat keeps the custard smooth. Overheating can make the eggs curdle and turn grainy.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Pecansfits about as well
  2. Almondfits about as well
  3. Walnutthe original
  4. Nutsfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, milk, cream, sugar, egg. 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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