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Dessert

Prune Whip

A custard dessert made with prunes, egg whites, egg yolks, sugar, milk, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Prune Whip

Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Prune Whip

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the prunes

  1. Soak the prunes overnight.

  2. Stew the prunes with the sugar until tender.

  3. Rub the prunes through a sieve.

Make the whip and bake

  1. Beat the egg whites to a stiff froth.

  2. Add the sifted prunes, mixing well.

  3. Heap the mixture on a platter.

  4. Bake at 300°F (150°C) for 15 to 20 minutes until browned delicately.

Make the custard

  1. Scald the milk.

  2. Beat the egg yolks slightly.

  3. Add 4 tablespoons of sugar and salt.

  4. Pour the hot milk onto the egg mixture.

  5. Cook in a double boiler until thickened.

  6. Flavor with vanilla extract when cold.

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

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

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

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

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

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

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

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

Prunes
Provide the main flavor and body, and their pulp forms the whip's base.
Egg whites
Whipped into a stiff froth, they give the whip its light, airy structure.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they cook gently with the hot milk.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, which thickens when heated with the eggs.
Sugar
Sweetens the prunes and custard and helps the whites hold their froth.

The step that matters

Pour the hot milk onto the egg mixture. Adding hot milk to beaten yolks gradually, rather than all at once, raises their temperature slowly so they thicken smoothly instead of scrambling.

“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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