Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Cream, Whipped
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
If you cannot get egg whites, use more eggs.
Boil 1 quart of milk down to 1 pint and mix with the whites of 3 eggs.
Sweeten and flavor the cream before using.
Flavor the sugar
Rub the rind of a lemon on the sugar and pound it in a mortar.
Mix the flavored sugar with sherry or brandy and the beaten egg white.
Whip and serve
Combine this mixture with the cream and whip it to a froth with a clean whisk.
As it rises, take spoonfuls and place them on a sieve to drain.
For best results, whip the cream a day in advance and keep it in a cool place.
Serve in glasses or a glass dish, garnished with spongecake, macaroons, or ratafias.
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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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Sherry + orangetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together823 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).
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Cream + sherrytop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,038 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).
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Sugar + orangetop 20% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19,212 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and orange barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,212 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
- Cream
- Its fat and air bubbles form the light, whipped body of the dish.
- Egg white
- Its proteins trap air and form a stable foam that holds the whipped cream.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the dish and helps stabilize the whipped foam.
- Sherry or brandy
- Adds aroma and flavor to the whipped cream.
The step that matters
Whipping to a froth and draining. Whip only until the cream forms a light froth, because overwhipping pushes the fat particles together, making the cream grainy or buttery. Draining the spoonfuls as they rise lets excess liquid run off so the froth holds its shape.
Swap the orange
The recipe marks orange as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, egg, sugar, sherry):
- Vanillafits better
- Strawberryfits better
- Raspberryfits better
- Orangethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, sugar, sherry. 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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