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Coffee Ice Cream

A chilled ice cream made with heavy cream, strong black coffee, sugar, arrowroot, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Coffee Ice Cream

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 ↓

Coffee Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the base

  1. Heat 1½ pints of cream nearly to boiling.

  2. Stir in the sugar until melted.

  3. Add the coffee.

  4. Add the arrowroot mixed with cold milk.

  5. Boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly.

Cool, whip and freeze

  1. Let it cool.

  2. Beat it until very light, gradually whipping in the remaining cream.

  3. Freeze the mixture.

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.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Coffee + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Cream + coffeetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,339 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Coffee + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,344 recipes

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

  5. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Heavy cream
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, creamy body in the finished ice cream.
Strong black coffee
Provides the main coffee flavor and aroma.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and keeps the frozen ice cream softer and scoopable.
Arrowroot
Thickens the base as it boils, giving a smooth, body-rich texture.

The step that matters

Boil for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Arrowroot only thickens fully once it has boiled. Constant stirring prevents lumps and scorching on the bottom of the pan, which would leave a grainy or burnt-tasting base.

Swap the arrowroot

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Sweet potatofits about as well
  4. Arrowrootthe original

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