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Plum Custard Tartlets

A baked tartlet filled with a plum custard made from plums, sugar, and eggs, topped with whipped egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Plum Custard 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 the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Whisk together the sieved plums, sugar, and beaten egg yolks until light and foamy.

  3. Fill small puff pastry shells with the plum mixture.

Top and bake

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Add powdered sugar to the stiff egg whites and spread over the plum filling.

  3. Bake the tartlets in the oven for a few moments until lightly browned.

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).

  2. Plum + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,313 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  3. Plum + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together794 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Greengage plums
Provide the fruit flavour and the tart, juicy base of the filling.
Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help it set into a smooth, thick filling.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks to form a light meringue topping that browns in the oven.
Sugar
Sweetens the plum filling and helps it thicken when cooked.

The step that matters

Baking the meringue topping until lightly browned. Stiff egg whites with powdered sugar can overbake and weep or turn dark quickly. Watching for a light golden colour, rather than a set time, keeps the topping tender and the custard underneath from overcooking.

Swap the plum

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Plumthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg. 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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