Skip to main content
Dessert

Tapioca Cream

A sweet, thickened milk dessert made with tapioca, sugar, eggs, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Tapioca Cream

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 ↓

Tapioca Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the tapioca in milk overnight.

  2. Boil the milk in a saucepan.

Make the cream

  1. Add the soaked tapioca and sugar mixed with the egg yolks to the boiling milk.

  2. Remove from heat once it comes to a boil.

  3. Stir in the vanilla and beaten egg whites.

  4. Stir occasionally while cooling.

  5. Serve 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. Milk + eggtop 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. Sugar + eggtop 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

Tapioca
Thickens the milk as it cooks, giving the cream its body.
Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help it thicken, adding richness and smoothness.
Egg whites
Beaten whites add light airiness to the finished cream.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the tapioca swells in and thickens.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the richness of the eggs and milk.

The step that matters

Remove from heat once it comes to a boil. Tapioca and egg yolks thicken as they heat, but overcooking can scorch the milk or curdle the yolks. Stopping promptly at a boil keeps the cream smooth and evenly thickened.

“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.

More tapioca cream recipes

Soup 33Pudding 6 See all 98 →

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesWhite CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipes