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Dessert

Snow Jelly

A chilled gelatin dessert made with sugar, lemon juice, egg whites, and custard of milk and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Snow Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Make the jelly

  1. Soak the gelatin in cold water for a few minutes.

  2. In a bowl, mix the sugar, lemon juice, and beaten egg whites.

  3. Add the boiling water to the soaked gelatin, then combine with the sugar and egg mixture.

  4. Beat thoroughly and strain into molds.

Make the custard and serve

  1. For the custard, heat the milk and whisk in the egg yolks.

  2. Pour the custard over the jelly before serving.

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 + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Gelatine
Sets the liquid mixture into a firm, wobbly jelly when cooled.
Egg whites
Whipped into the mixture to create a light, airy, foamy texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the jelly its body.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweetness of the jelly.
Milk
Forms the base of the custard, adding richness and creaminess.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness through their proteins and fat.

The step that matters

Beat thoroughly and strain into molds. Beaten egg whites trap air and can deflate or weep if the mixture is not beaten enough or is left to stand. Straining removes lumps and bits of unbeaten white, giving a smooth, even set.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, milk. 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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