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Dessert

Pineapple Mousse

A chilled dessert made with pineapple, gelatin, lemon juice, sugar, whipped cream, and grated pineapple.

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

Pineapple Mousse

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mousse base

  1. Dissolve a teaspoonful of gelatin in one half teacup of hot water. Add to the syrup of one can of pineapple along with the juice of one lemon and one-half teacup of granulated sugar. Stir until the mixture is cold and begins to thicken.

  2. Fold in three teacups of whipped cream and three grated pineapples with a spoon.

Freeze and chill

  1. Pour the mixture into a mold and pack it in salt and ice.

  2. Refrigerate for five hours before serving.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

194Calories
2 gProtein
6 gFat
39 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Pineapple1 cup chunks (165g)82
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

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. See the original page.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Lemon + pineappletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + pineappletop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,841 recipes

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

  5. Cream + pineappletop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,574 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Gelatine
Sets the liquid mixture so it holds its shape when chilled.
Whipped cream
Adds richness and a light, airy texture to the mousse.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the mousse and balances the tart pineapple and lemon.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens the pineapple flavour.

The step that matters

Stir until the mixture is cold and begins to thicken. Gelatine sets only as the mixture cools. If the base is folded with cream before it thickens, the gelatine cannot hold the airy cream, and the mousse may stay loose or separate.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Bananafits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, pineapple. 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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