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Dessert

Stawberry Cream Pie

A pie with a strawberry custard filling, jam base, and meringue topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Stawberry Cream Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Heat the milk in a saucepan until warm.

  2. Whisk the egg yolks and cornstarch together until smooth.

  3. Gradually add the warm milk to the egg mixture, stirring constantly.

  4. Return the mixture to the saucepan and cook over medium heat until thickened.

  5. Sweeten to taste.

  6. Let the mixture cool.

Assemble and bake

  1. Spread a layer of jam in the pie crust.

  2. Pour the cooled cream mixture over the jam.

  3. Top the pie with meringue.

  4. Bake until golden.

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. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  2. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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 custard and add richness and a smooth, creamy texture.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk mixture as it heats, giving the cream a stable body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the cream filling.
Strawberries
Add fruit flavor and tartness to the filling.
Jam
Adds a sweet fruit layer beneath the cream filling.

The step that matters

Cook the custard until thickened. Egg yolks and cornstarch thicken only when heated enough, but overheating can scramble the yolks and leave lumps. Stir constantly over medium heat and remove from heat once thick.

“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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