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Dessert

Rissoles a LA Creme

A sweet pastry made from a thickened milk custard, folded into squares and filled with jam.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Rissoles a LA Creme

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. In a double boiler, bring the milk to a boil.

  2. Mix the flour and cornstarch with a little cold milk until smooth, then add to the boiling milk.

  3. Stir until thickened, then remove from heat.

  4. Add the beaten eggs, sugar, vanilla, rose water, and lemon peel, then return to heat briefly.

Set and shape

  1. Pour the mixture onto a platter to cool and harden.

  2. Cut into squares or scoop teaspoonfuls for each rissole.

Fill and serve

  1. Fill with thick jam before serving.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

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

  3. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Rose + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,174 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Vanilla + rosetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together456 recipes

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

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

Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard that thickens and sets.
Flour
Thickens the milk together with cornstarch, giving the custard body.
Cornstarch
Gelatinises when heated, thickening the custard and helping it set firm.
Eggs
Add richness and, when heated, help the custard set and firm up.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps give it a tender texture.

The step that matters

Return the mixture to heat briefly after adding the eggs. Eggs thicken as they heat, but overheating can make them curdle or turn grainy. Heating only briefly lets the custard firm without scrambling the eggs.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Peachfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, egg, sugar, vanilla, rose. 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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