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Dessert

Fried Cream

Fried Cream is a custard made from milk, sugar, eggs, and spices, fried and served with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

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

  2. Stir in the sugar, cornstarch, and flour (rubbed smooth 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 the yolks.

  5. Remove from heat, discard 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.

Coat and fry

  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.

  3. Dip into boiling hot lard using a wire basket if available.

  4. Fry until golden brown, then place in the oven for 4-5 minutes to soften.

Serve

  1. Sprinkle with pulverized sugar and serve immediately.

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

Milk
Forms the liquid base that the starch and egg yolks thicken into a custard.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set and add richness to the pudding.
Cornstarch
Thickens the custard and sets it firm enough to cut and coat.
Flour
Adds body to the custard, helping it set stiff when cooled.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps give the fried coating its flavor.
Eggs
Bind the cracker crumbs to the pudding pieces so the coating holds in the fat.

The step that matters

Let the custard cool until stiff before cutting. The starch must gel fully as it cools; cutting or coating a soft custard makes pieces collapse and the coating slide off in the hot lard.

“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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