Why it works: Corn and cinnamon work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and 647 recipes mention both. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓
Corn Starch Blanc Mange
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Measure out 1 pint of milk.
Dissolve 2 tablespoons of corn starch in ½ cup of the milk.
Make the pudding
In a double boiler, heat the remaining milk with the cinnamon, sugar, and salt.
Add the dissolved corn starch to the heated milk and stir until thickened.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Corn + cinnamontop 9% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together647 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together12,655 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Cinnamon + sugartop 10% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together30,779 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Cinnamon and sugar share little aroma chemistry, yet 30,779 recipes mention both: they likely 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
- Corn starch
- Thickens the milk into a smooth pudding as it heats and gelatinizes.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the starch thickens into a creamy custard.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness to the pudding.
The step that matters
Add the dissolved corn starch to the heated milk and stir until thickened. Cornstarch must be dissolved in cold milk first so it does not clump. Stirring while the milk is hot lets the starch granules swell evenly and thicken the pudding smoothly.
“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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