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Dessert

Golden Parfait

A chilled dessert made with sugar, water, egg yolks, gelatin, vanilla, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Gelatin and cream match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,628 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Golden Parfait

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Soften the gelatin in cold water until it is covered.

  2. Boil the sugar and water together for five minutes.

  3. Slowly pour the hot mixture over the beaten egg yolks.

  4. Cook over boiling water, stirring constantly, until the mixture coats the spoon.

  5. Add the softened gelatin and chill until beginning to congeal.

Finish and freeze

  1. Fold in the vanilla and whipped cream.

  2. Transfer to a tray and freeze for 5 to 6 hours.

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. Gelatin + creamtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

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

  5. Vanilla + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,301 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the base and add richness as they cook into a custard.
Gelatin
Sets the mixture so it holds its shape when frozen.
Heavy cream
Adds airy, rich texture when whipped and folded in.
Sugar
Sweetens the dish and softens the texture of the frozen mixture.

The step that matters

Cooking the custard until it coats the spoon. Egg yolks thicken as they heat, but if they get too hot they can scramble and curdle. Stirring constantly over gentle boiling water keeps the heat even and the custard smooth.

“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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