Why it works: Black tea and sugar work together. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and 113 recipes mention both. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Make the custard
Mix the tea, sugar and beaten yolks of eggs together, cook in double boiler until thick and creamy.
Build the parfait
When cold, mix with the cream beaten stiff, and the whites of the eggs, also.
Cut the candied peel in small pieces, soak until very soft in maraschino or orange syrup or juice, fold into the mixture.
Pack in ice and salt for three or four hours.
Serve
Serve, garnished with candied peel.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Black tea + sugartop 19% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together113 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Cream + sugartop 5% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together43,437 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Sugar + eggtop 10% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together122,252 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Cream + eggtop 12% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together41,958 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Black tea + eggtop 24% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together35 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
- Yolks thicken the sweet tea custard, and whites lighten the frozen mixture.
- Heavy cream
- Beaten stiff, it adds richness and an airy, smooth texture to the frozen dessert.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the custard and lowers the freezing point, keeping the parfait soft.
- Strong black tea
- Provides the main flavour and liquid base of the custard.
The step that matters
Cook the custard until thick and creamy. Gentle heat in a double boiler thickens the egg yolks without scrambling them. Overheating curdles the eggs, leaving a grainy custard that won't blend smoothly with the cream.
“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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