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Dessert

Zabajone, Iced

Iced zabaglione is a chilled Italian dessert made with egg yolks, sugar, Marsala wine, vanilla, cinnamon, lemon peel, maraschino, rum, and isinglass.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,287 recipes. Both carry 4-methoxybenzaldehyde, which smells sweet, anise. The science ↓

Zabajone, Iced

Ingredients

Directions

Make the zabaglione

  1. In a bowl, mix the egg yolks, castor sugar, and Marsala wine.

  2. Add the vanilla, cinnamon, and lemon peel.

  3. Whip the mixture lightly over low heat until nearly boiling and slightly frothy.

  4. Remove from heat and take out the cinnamon, vanilla, and lemon peel.

  5. Whip the mixture for 1-2 minutes away from the heat.

Chill and serve

  1. Stir in the maraschino, rum, and dissolved isinglass.

  2. Pour into a silver souffle dish and place on ice.

  3. Serve with sponge cakes or ice wafers.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  2. Vanilla + rumtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together728 recipes

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

  3. Cinnamon + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

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

  5. Wine + rumtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together230 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-propylphenol (allspice, anise).

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

Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture as they cook, giving the zabaglione its creamy, rich body.
Marsala wine
Adds its fortified-wine flavour and liquid to the custard base.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps stabilise the whipped yolks.
Isinglass
Gelatine-like setting agent that firms the chilled dessert.

The step that matters

Whip over low heat until nearly boiling. Egg yolks thicken gently as they warm; if the heat is too high they scramble and curdle, so the mixture must be whipped over low heat and kept below boiling.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, wine, vanilla, cinnamon, rum):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Pineapplefits better
  3. Pearfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, wine, vanilla, cinnamon, rum. 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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