Skip to main content
Dessert

Sea Weed Blancmange

A custard dessert made with carrageen moss, milk, eggs, sugar, vanilla, and strained jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Sea Weed Blancmange

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the moss

  1. Wash the carrageen moss in several waters.

  2. Soak the moss overnight in water.

  3. Squeeze the seaweed and place it in a saucepan with boiling water.

  4. Boil for 1 hour, then strain through a jelly bag.

Make the custard

  1. Make a custard by combining milk, eggs, sugar, and vanilla in a bowl.

  2. Add 2 cups of the strained jelly to the custard and stir until dissolved.

Set and chill

  1. Pour the mixture into molds and refrigerate until set.

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. 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. Egg + sugartop 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

Carrigean moss
Carrageen seaweed releases gelling compounds that set the liquid into a firm, wobbly jelly.
Eggs
Egg proteins thicken the custard and add richness and structure to the set dessert.
Milk
Milk forms the creamy base of the custard and adds body and mouthfeel.
Sugar
Sugar sweetens the dessert and balances the savory taste of the seaweed.

The step that matters

Boil the moss for the full hour. Carrageen only releases its gelling compounds fully after prolonged simmering in water. Under-boiling leaves the jelly weak, so the blancmange may fail to set firmly when chilled.

“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.

You might also like

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