Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Ice Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Make the custard
Beat the eggs thoroughly.
Add the sugar, cornstarch, and milk to the eggs.
Pour the mixture into a pail and place it in a kettle filled with water.
Cook the mixture until it thickens.
Finish and freeze
Let it cool, then add the flavoring and freeze.
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.
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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 proteins set when heated, giving the custard body and richness.
- Cornstarch
- Starch swells when heated with liquid, thickening the mixture into a smooth custard.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and softens the frozen texture by lowering the freezing point.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base, with milk fat and solids adding creaminess.
- Flavoring
- Provides the aroma and taste that define the finished ice cream.
The step that matters
Cook the mixture until it thickens. Egg proteins set with gentle heat, but overheating can curdle them into grainy bits. Cooking too little leaves the starch and eggs unset, so the custard stays thin.
“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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