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Tea Ice Cream

A chilled dessert made by infusing cream with Old Hyson tea, sweetened, and frozen.

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

Why it works: Cream and sugar 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 ↓

Tea Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Infuse the tea

  1. Pour 4 tablespoons of Old Hyson tea over 1 pint of cream.

  2. Scald the mixture in a custard kettle or by placing it in a kettle of boiling water.

  3. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes.

  4. Strain the mixture into 1 pint of cold cream.

Make the custard

  1. Scald the cold cream mixture again.

  2. When hot, mix in 4 beaten eggs and ¾ pound of sugar.

Cool and freeze

  1. Let cool and then freeze.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  3. Tea + creamtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together463 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Tea + sugartop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,204 recipes

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

Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Cream
Provides fat for a rich, smooth texture and carries the tea flavor.
Eggs
Their proteins thicken the custard as it heats, giving the ice cream body and structure.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer.
Old hyson tea
Supplies the main aroma and flavor of the ice cream.

The step that matters

Mixing the eggs and sugar into the hot cream. Egg proteins thicken the custard as it heats, but if the mixture gets too hot the eggs can scramble and turn grainy. Keep the heat gentle once the eggs go in.

“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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