Skip to main content
Dessert

Caramel Cream

A custard dessert made with cream, caramel, eggs, and brown sugar, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Caramel Cream

Why it works: Sugar and cream 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 ↓

Caramel Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Scald the cream in a saucepan.

  2. Add the caramel to the hot cream.

  3. Beat the egg and egg yolks together.

  4. Stir the beaten eggs into the hot cream mixture.

  5. Add the brown sugar and mix well.

  6. Pour the mixture into a buttered mold.

Cook and chill

  1. Place the mold in a saucepan with hot water, covering both the mold and saucepan.

  2. Keep the water near boiling until the mixture is stiffened.

  3. Let it cool, then refrigerate until needed.

Serve

  1. Serve on a platter with vanilla custard or on a fringed napkin with cream.

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.

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.

  1. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

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

  3. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Eggs
Set the custard as they cook, giving it a firm, sliceable structure.
Egg yolks
Add richness and smoothness while helping the custard set firmly.
Cream
Provides fat and moisture, giving the custard a soft, creamy texture.
Caramel
Adds sweetness and caramel flavour to the custard.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses-like depth of flavour.

The step that matters

Keep the water near boiling, not boiling. Gentle, near-boiling heat lets the egg proteins set into a smooth custard. Too much heat curdles the eggs and leaves a grainy, watery texture.

“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.

More caramel custard recipes

Pudding 3Soft 3 See all 133 →

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes