Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Tapioca Cream
Ingredients
Directions
In a double boiler, combine the soaked tapioca and milk.
Boil until the mixture is clear.
Add sugar to taste.
Stir in the beaten egg yolks and boil for only one minute.
Remove from heat and gently fold in the beaten egg whites and flavoring.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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 + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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
- Tapioca
- Thickens the milk as it cooks, giving the cream its body and clear appearance.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich the custard and add richness and thickening once heated.
- Egg whites
- Beaten stiff and folded in at the end to lighten the cream's texture.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the tapioca swells and cooks in.
The step that matters
Boil the egg yolks for only one minute. Egg yolks thicken when heated but can curdle or scramble if overcooked, so the brief boil should be timed closely.
“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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