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Dessert

Fried Cream, Cremk Frite

A sweet, cinnamon‑flavored pudding that is cooled, cut, coated in crumbs, fried, and briefly baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,287 recipes. Both carry 4-methoxybenzaldehyde, which smells sweet, anise. The science ↓

Fried Cream, Cremk Frite

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Put the cinnamon into the milk and heat until just about to boil.

  2. Stir in the sugar, corn starch, and flour (previously mixed with 2–3 tablespoons of cold milk).

  3. Cook over heat for 2 minutes to fully cook the starch and flour.

  4. Remove from heat, stir in the beaten egg yolks, and return to heat briefly to set them.

  5. Take off heat, remove the cinnamon, and stir in the butter and vanilla.

  6. Pour the mixture onto a buttered platter until about ⅓ inch high and let it cool until stiff.

Cut and coat

  1. Cut the pudding into parallelograms about 3 inches long and 2 inches wide.

  2. Roll each piece in sifted cracker crumbs, then in the beaten eggs, and again in cracker crumbs.

Fry and serve

  1. Dip into boiling lard (use a wire basket if available) and fry until golden.

  2. Place fried pieces in the oven for 4–5 minutes to soften the pudding.

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. Cinnamon + vanillatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  2. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  5. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set when gently heated, giving it a rich, firm body.
Corn starch
Thickens the milk mixture into a stiff custard as its starch gelatinizes when cooked.
Flour
Adds additional thickening to the custard so it sets firm enough to cut and fry.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and adds body to the pudding.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the starches and yolks thicken into custard.
Eggs
Bind the coating so the cracker crumbs stick to the pudding pieces before frying.

The step that matters

Cook the starch and flour fully before adding the yolks. Raw starch and flour taste pasty and will not thicken properly, so the mixture must cook for the full two minutes. Adding the yolks afterward and heating only briefly keeps them from scrambling while still setting the custard firm enough to cut and fry.

“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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