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Dessert

Banana Sherbet

A frozen dessert made with milk, cream, eggs, sliced bananas, lemon juice, lemon Jello, and hot water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Banana Sherbet

Why it works: Milk and banana are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,470 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Banana Sherbet

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a bowl, combine milk, cream, and eggs.

  2. Add sliced bananas and mix well.

  3. Stir in the juice of 4 lemons.

  4. Dissolve 2 tablespoons of lemon Jello in a little hot water and add to the mixture.

Freeze

  1. Freeze until firm.

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 + bananatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,470 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  3. Banana + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,134 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  4. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Milk
Supplies liquid and milk solids that give the sherbet a creamy body.
Cream
Adds fat that makes the frozen mixture smooth and rich.
Eggs
Their proteins and yolk fat help thicken and enrich the base for a smooth texture.
Bananas
Provide sweetness, flavor and body as they blend into the base.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the sweetness.
Lemon jello
Its gelatin helps give the frozen dessert a firmer, smoother texture.

The step that matters

Dissolve the Jello fully in hot water. Gelatin only sets properly when it is completely dissolved. Undissolved granules can leave specks or soft spots, so stir until the liquid is clear before adding it to the mixture.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, cream, egg, banana. 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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