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Dessert

Vanilla Cheesecakes

A baked dessert made with butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, brandy, and jelly, lined in pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and raspberry work together. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 950 recipes. Both carry ethyl benzoate, which smells fruity, sweet. The science ↓

Vanilla Cheesecakes

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 the filling

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan, then stir in the crushed loaf sugar until melted and thick.

  2. Gradually pour the mixture into the beaten eggs while beating continuously.

  3. Once cooled, add the vanilla sugar, vanilla essence, and brandy.

Bake and serve

  1. Line patty pans with pastry, add a little jelly, and fill with the mixture.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until set.

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. Vanilla + raspberrytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together950 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (fruity, sweet).

  2. Lemon + raspberrytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,109 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

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

  4. Vanilla + brandytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together806 recipes

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

  5. Brandy + raspberrytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together235 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-hex-3-en-1-ol (freshly cut grass green and herbaceous notes).

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

Butter
Adds richness and a tender, smooth texture to the filling.
Eggs
Set when baked, giving the filling its structure and body.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps it thicken as it melts into the butter.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour that complements the vanilla.
Vanilla sugar
Sweetens the filling and adds a vanilla aroma.

The step that matters

Pour the butter mixture into the eggs gradually. Adding hot liquid to eggs too quickly can scramble them. Pouring slowly while beating keeps the eggs smooth and evenly combined so the filling sets uniformly.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, vanilla, brandy, raspberry):

  1. Blackberryfits better
  2. Peachfits better
  3. Apricotfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, vanilla, brandy, raspberry. 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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