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Dessert

Ices, Custard for Ice Puddings

A custard made from milk, cream, egg yolks, powdered sugar, and flavoring, used for ice puddings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Ices, Custard for Ice Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Combine milk and cream in a saucepan.

  2. Stir in the egg yolks.

  3. Warm over low heat, stirring constantly until thickened to custard consistency; do not let it boil.

  4. Remove from heat and add powdered sugar and flavoring.

  5. Strain the mixture through a sieve.

  6. If desired, add glace cherries or dried fruits.

Freeze

  1. Pour the mixture into a freezing pot and embed it in a mixture of rough ice and salt.

  2. Stir continuously using a spatula or stirrer until frozen.

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

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

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

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

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Cream + vanillatop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,301 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness as they set gently with heat.
Cream
Adds fat for a smooth, rich texture in the frozen result.
Milk
Provides the liquid base that the yolks thicken into custard.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the base and dissolves easily into the warm custard.

The step that matters

Warm the custard gently without boiling. Egg yolks thicken as they heat, but past a certain temperature they scramble and curdle. Stirring constantly over low heat keeps the custard smooth and evenly thickened.

“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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