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Cocoanut Ice

A chilled coconut ice made by boiling grated coconut, adding sugar and egg whites, then freezing with ice and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Cocoanut Ice

Why it works: Coconut and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,648 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cocoanut Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Make the coconut liquid

  1. Boil the grated coconut meat and its milk with 3 quarts of filtered water for 10 minutes.

  2. Pour the mixture into an earthen or stoneware crock, cover, and let it infuse until nearly cold.

  3. Strain the liquid through a fine sieve, pressing off the liquid.

Freeze

  1. Add 1 lb of pulverized sugar and the whites of 3 eggs to the liquid, mixing thoroughly.

  2. Pour the mixture into a freezer already packed with ice and salt.

  3. Freeze and finish as you would with other ices.

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. Coconut + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,648 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Coconut + sugartop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,742 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

Eggs
Egg whites add body and help the frozen mixture set with a lighter, smoother texture.
Pulverized sugar
Sugar adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer when frozen.
Coconuts
Coconut meat and milk supply the main flavor and richness of the base.

The step that matters

Straining the liquid. Pressing too hard through the sieve pushes fine coconut solids into the base, which can make the texture gritty. Straining gently keeps the liquid smooth.

Swap the coconut

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Coconutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, egg. 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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