Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓
Self-freezing Ice Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Make the custard
Heat the milk in a saucepan.
In a bowl, mix the eggs and sugar.
Pour the hot milk over the eggs and sugar.
Cook the mixture steadily for 15 minutes until it thickens.
Once cold, add the cream and mix well.
Freeze
Place the custard in an old-fashioned upright freezer.
Crush a block of ice and layer it with rock salt in the freezer.
Beat the custard for 5 minutes with a flat stick or ladle before covering.
Seal the freezer tightly and pack more ice and salt on top.
After 1.5 hours, open the freezer, wipe off the salt, and stir the frozen custard.
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.
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Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,187 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
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Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together35,032 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Cream + vanillatop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together12,301 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
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Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together29,399 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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
- Eggs
- Cooked gently, they thicken the custard and give the ice cream a rich, smooth body.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer and scoopable.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base of the custard that freezes into the ice cream.
- Rich, sweet cream
- Adds fat, which makes the ice cream creamy and smooth on the palate.
- Vanilla bean
- Provides the main aroma and flavour of the ice cream.
The step that matters
Cook the custard steadily until it thickens. Egg proteins set as the custard heats, thickening it. If it is heated too hard or too fast, the eggs can scramble and curdle, leaving a grainy texture in the finished ice cream.
“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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