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Dessert

Spanish Cream

A gelatin-based custard dessert with macaroons, maraschino cherries, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Spanish Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Dissolve the gelatine in ½ cup of milk and add it to 1 cup of hot milk in a double boiler.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Add the beaten egg yolks and boil until thick.

  4. Fold in the beaten egg whites.

Mold and set

  1. Mold the mixture in individual cups, placing a macaroon and Maraschino cherries at the bottom.

  2. Let it stand overnight.

Serve

  1. Serve with whipped cream, garnished with cherries.

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

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Milk + sugartop 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).

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

Gelatine
Sets the liquid mixture into a firm, sliceable custard as it cools.
Eggs
Yolks thicken the custard on heating, and folded whites add a light, airy texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that dissolves the gelatine and cooks into the custard.
Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness to the custard.

The step that matters

Boiling the egg yolks until thick. Egg yolks thicken when heated, but if they get too hot or boil too long they can curdle and turn grainy. Stirring steadily and watching the texture keeps the custard smooth.

“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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