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Dessert

Almond Custard

A custard made with milk, almonds, eggs, and sugar, topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Almond Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Scald the milk in a saucepan.

  2. In a bowl, combine the beaten egg yolks, sugar, and almond paste.

  3. Gradually add the scalded milk to the mixture, stirring constantly.

  4. Cook over medium heat until the mixture thickens.

  5. Once thickened, let it cool slightly, then pour into cups.

Make the meringue and serve

  1. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until soft peaks form.

  2. Gradually add powdered sugar and bitter almond extract, continuing to beat until stiff peaks form.

  3. Heap the meringue on top of each cup of custard.

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. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

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

  3. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Milk + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,800 recipes

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

  5. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

Vanilla and sugar 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set during gentle cooking and add richness.
Egg whites
Whipped into a foam that forms the light meringue topping.
Rich milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard that the eggs thicken.
Blanched almonds
Provide the main almond flavor and body in the custard.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps stabilise the egg yolks.

The step that matters

Cook over medium heat until the mixture thickens. Egg yolks thicken at around 160°F to 170°F; heating too fast or too long can scramble them into lumps, so stir constantly and watch closely.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Chestnutfits about as well
  3. Cocoafits about as well
  4. Hazelnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, vanilla, egg, 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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