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Dessert

Boiled Custard

A custard made with scalded milk, egg yolks, sugar, salt, vanilla, and sherry wine, cooked in a double boiler.

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 ↓

Boiled Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the egg yolks slightly in a bowl.

  2. Add the sugar and salt, mixing well.

  3. Slowly stir in the scalded milk while constantly stirring.

  4. Cook the mixture in a double boiler, stirring until it thickens to the consistency of thin cream.

Strain and serve

  1. Strain the custard immediately to remove any lumps.

  2. Chill the custard and add the vanilla and sherry wine 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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

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

  2. Vanilla + sherrytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together506 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  3. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Milk + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Vanilla and sugar 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 as they set with gentle heat and add richness.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the egg yolks thicken into a custard.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and softens the flavor of the egg yolks.

The step that matters

Cooking in the double boiler. Egg yolks set at gentle heat, and if the mixture gets too hot it can curdle or turn grainy. Constant stirring and indirect heat keep the custard smooth and 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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