Why it works: Milk and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Snow Custard
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the custard
Beat the 8 egg yolks.
Set aside the whites of 4 eggs.
Add the milk and 5 tablespoons of sugar to the yolks and mix well.
Place the mixture in a dish.
Set it in a pan of hot water.
Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until set, then let cool.
Make the meringue and finish
Beat the reserved egg whites until stiff.
Gradually add 1 cup of powdered sugar and 1 teaspoon of lemon juice.
Spread the meringue over the cooled custard in heaps, ensuring the heaps do not touch.
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.
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Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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
- Yolks set the custard into a firm, sliceable body, and whites whip into the meringue's airy structure.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid base that gives the custard its soft, creamy moisture.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps stabilize the whipped egg white foam.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that helps keep the beaten egg white foam stable.
The step that matters
Beating the egg whites until stiff. Whites must be whipped to stiff peaks, with sugar added gradually, so the foam holds its shape and does not weep. Underbeaten or greasy whites collapse and make the meringue runny.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, sugar):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Raisinfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, sugar. 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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