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Dessert

Banana Blanc Mange

A custard dessert made with milk, cornstarch, sugar, vanilla, and sliced bananas.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and banana are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,430 recipes. Both carry ethyl isobutyrate, which smells fruity, ethereal. The science ↓

Banana Blanc Mange

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pudding

  1. In a pot, combine boiling milk, cornstarch, and sugar; boil until thick.

  2. Once thickened, let it cool.

Finish and serve

  1. Stir in vanilla and sliced bananas.

  2. Mould the mixture and turn it out onto a serving plate.

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. Vanilla + bananatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

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

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

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

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

  4. Milk + bananatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,470 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, 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 cornstarch thickens into a creamy custard.
Cornstarch
Thickens the hot milk as its starch swells, giving the pudding a set, spoonable body.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the flavour of the milk and bananas.
Bananas
Add banana flavour and natural sweetness, and soften as the pudding sits.
Vanilla
Adds a warm, aromatic flavour that rounds out the custard.

The step that matters

Boil until thick. Cornstarch only thickens fully once the mixture reaches a boil. Stopping early leaves the custard thin and can leave a raw starchy taste.

Swap the banana

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

  1. Figfits better
  2. Peachfits about as well
  3. Blueberryfits about as well
  4. Bananathe original

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