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Dessert

Irish Moss Blanc Mange

A sweet pudding made from Irish moss, milk, sugar, vanilla, topped with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Irish Moss Blanc Mange

Why it works: Irish moss and vanilla share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 58 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Irish Moss Blanc Mange

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the Irish moss carefully.

  2. Simmer the moss in 3 pints of new milk until it dissolves.

  3. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

  4. Sweeten to taste and season with vanilla.

Set and serve

  1. Pour into molds and cool.

  2. Refrigerate until set.

  3. Serve with whipped cream seasoned with Sherry wine or vanilla.

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. Irish moss + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together58 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  3. Vanilla + sherrytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together506 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

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

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

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

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

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

Irish moss
Its natural gelling compounds thicken the milk and let the pudding set when cooled.
New milk
Forms the base of the pudding and carries the moss's setting power.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the mild, milky flavour.
Whipped cream
Adds richness and a light, soft contrast to the set pudding.

The step that matters

Simmer the moss until it dissolves. The moss must be fully dissolved into the milk so its gelling compounds are evenly distributed; undissolved pieces leave lumps and weak spots in the set pudding.

“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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