Name: Broad Beans a LA Poulette
Ingredients: 1½ cups milk; 3 whole eggs; 2 egg yolks; 2 tablespoons ginger syrup; Zest of 1 lemon or orange; Butter for greasing; Preserved ginger for decoration; Additional preserved ginger for mincing

Why it works: Ginger and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,154 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Broad Beans a LA Poulette

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the milk, then let it cool.
In a bowl, beat together the ginger syrup, whole eggs, and egg yolks.
Add the cooled milk and zest to the egg mixture.
Place the mixture over a bain-marie and stir until it thickens into a custard.
Butter a charlotte mold and line it with buttered paper.
Cut a pattern from preserved ginger and place it on top of the mold.
Mince the trimmings of preserved ginger and add enough to yield 4 tablespoons.
Stir the minced ginger into the custard, fill the mold, and steam gently for 45-50 minutes until firm.
Turn out the custard and serve with a ginger and lemon juice syrup.

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.

Ginger + lemontop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,154 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,227 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Ginger + syruptop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together950 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

Swap the ginger

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

Cinnamonfits better
Nutmegfits better
Parsleyfits better
Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, syrup, lemon, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

Lemon Cake228 recipes

Ginger Cookies213 recipes

Lemon Ice147 recipes

Lemon Sherbet103 recipes

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Broad Beans a LA Poulette