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Dessert

Creamed Tartlets

A small pastry tartlet filled with jam and custard, topped with a frothy icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Creamed Tartlets

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Line tartlet tins with puff pastry.

  2. Spread a thin layer of jam in each tin.

  3. Pour a little custard over the jam.

Make the topping

  1. In a bowl, whisk the egg white to a solid froth, then mix in the sugar.

  2. Place a small amount of the icing over each tartlet.

Bake

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 20 minutes.

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. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Puff pastry
Forms a crisp, flaky case that holds the filling while baking.
Jam
Adds sweetness and fruit flavor under the custard.
Custard
Provides moisture and richness that softens as the tartlet bakes.
Egg white
Whisked to a foam, it gives the topping light structure that sets in the oven.
White sugar
Sweetens the topping and helps stabilize the whisked egg white foam.

The step that matters

Whisk the egg white to a solid froth. The foam gives the topping its structure. Underwhipped egg white stays runny and slides off the tartlet, while overwhipped egg white turns grainy and collapses in the oven.

“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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