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Dessert

Cheese Mousse

A chilled dessert made with whipped cream, cheese, lemon juice, and gelatin, served with mayonnaise and lettuce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Cheese Mousse

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Juice the lemon and set aside.

  2. Finely grind the green peppers using a meat chopper.

Make the mousse

  1. Whip the cream until nearly stiff, then add the lemon juice and whip until stiff.

  2. Fold the ground peppers and grated cheese into the whipped cream.

  3. Add salt and cayenne pepper to taste.

  4. Soften the gelatin in a little cold water, then dissolve it over heat and fold it into the mixture.

  5. Chill in the refrigerator until set.

Serve

  1. Serve with mayonnaise and lettuce.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Cream + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Pepper + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Lemon + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,559 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Cheese + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,655 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Heavy cream
Whipped into foam, it forms the light, airy body of the mousse.
Gelatin
Sets the whipped mixture so it holds its shape when chilled.
Grated cheese
Adds rich flavor and body to the mousse.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor of the cheese and cream.
Green peppers
Contribute fresh, vegetal flavor and texture through the mousse.

The step that matters

Whip the cream until nearly stiff, then add the lemon juice and whip until stiff.. Cream must be whipped to the right stage so it traps air and holds structure. Over-whipping can turn it grainy or buttery, while under-whipping leaves the mousse loose and unable to set light.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, pepper, cream, gelatin, lettuce):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Mangofits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, pepper, cream, gelatin, lettuce. 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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