Why it works: Milk and sherry are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,479 recipes. Both carry 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine, which smells cocoa, roasted. The science ↓
Whey, Wine
Ingredients
Directions
Curdle the milk
Boil the milk in a saucepan.
Stir in the sherry or raisin wine until it curdles.
Bring it back to a boil and let it stand for a few minutes.
Remove the curd and pour off the clear whey.
Sweeten and serve
Sweeten the whey to taste.
If for an invalid, add a little hot water.
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.
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Milk + sherrytop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,479 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sherry + sugartop 22% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,141 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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
- Milk
- Its proteins clump into curds when acid is added, separating the solids from the clear whey.
- Sherry or raisin wine
- Its acid makes the milk proteins curdle, which is what separates the whey.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness to the finished whey.
The step that matters
Stir in the sherry or raisin wine until it curdles. The acid in the wine causes the milk proteins to clump into curds. Boiling the milk first and letting it stand afterwards helps the curds firm up and separate cleanly from the clear whey.
“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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