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Dessert

Snow Custard

A custard dessert made with milk, eggs, sugar, lemon, gelatin, and meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Women of the First Congregational Church (Marysville, Ohio) · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 27 ingredients
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Snow Custard

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Snow Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gelatine

  1. Soak the gelatine for one hour in a teacup of cold water.

  2. Add one pint boiling water to the gelatine, stir until thoroughly dissolved.

  3. Add two-thirds of the sugar and the lemon juice.

Whip the meringue

  1. Beat the whites of the eggs to a stiff froth.

  2. When the gelatine is quite cold, whip it into the whites a spoonful at a time, for at least an hour.

  3. Whip steadily and evenly until all is stiff.

Set and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a mold previously wet with cold water, and set in a cold place.

  2. In four or five hours turn into a glass dish.

  3. Make a custard of the milk, yolk of eggs, and remainder of the sugar, flavor with vanilla or bitter almond.

  4. When the meringue is turned out of the mold, pour this custard around the base.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

390Calories
15 gProtein
25 gFat
29 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Waternot in our table0

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

By Women of the First Congregational Church (Marysville, Ohio). 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.

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 + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the whipped mixture so it holds its shape when turned out of the mold.
Eggs
Whites whipped to a stiff froth give the dessert its light, airy structure.
Sugar
Sweetens the dessert and helps stabilise the whipped whites.
Milk
Forms the base of the custard served around the meringue.

The step that matters

Whipping the gelatine into the whites. The gelatine must be cold but still liquid, or it will set in lumps; whipping it in a spoonful at a time keeps the foam light and evenly aerated.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

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