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Dessert

Coffee Frappe

A chilled coffee dessert made with coffee, gelatin, sugar, eggs, vanilla, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and gelatin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,628 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Coffee Frappe

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the coffee

  1. Strain the strong coffee.

  2. Add gelatin to the coffee.

  3. Heat the coffee until the gelatin melts.

  4. Strain the mixture through a fine cloth.

  5. Let the mixture cool.

Make the frappe

  1. Add sugar and egg whites.

  2. Beat the mixture.

  3. Fold in the whipped cream.

  4. Pour the mixture into a mold.

  5. Freeze for 3 hours.

  6. Serve with additional whipped cream.

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. Cream + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  4. Coffee + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,391 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  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

Eggs
Egg whites add foam and lightness when beaten into the mixture.
Granulated sugar
Sugar sweetens the frappe and helps stabilise the beaten foam.
Whipped cream
Whipped cream adds air and a creamy, soft texture to the frozen dessert.
Gelatin
Gelatin sets the mixture so it holds its shape when frozen and served.

The step that matters

Beat the mixture. Beating incorporates air into the egg whites and sugar, creating foam that gives the frozen frappe a light texture. Under-beaten mixture stays dense and icy.

“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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