Name: Strawberry Ice Cream
Ingredients: 1 pint strawberries; 1 pint cream; ½ pound powdered white sugar; juice of 1 lemon; a little new milk (optional)

Why it works: Cream and sugar 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 ↓

Strawberry Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the strawberries

Mash the strawberries through a sieve to remove the seeds.

Mix and freeze

Mix the mashed strawberries with cream, sugar, and lemon juice.
Freeze the mixture.
If desired, add a little fresh milk to help it freeze more quickly.

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.

Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

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

Strawberries: Provide the main flavour and fruit body, and their pulp gives the ice cream its colour.
Cream: Adds fat, which makes the ice cream rich and smooth in texture.
Powdered white sugar: Sweetens the mixture and lowers its freezing point, keeping it softer when frozen.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the strawberry flavour and balances the sweetness.