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Cream Fritters

A sweet milk-based fritter thickened with cornstarch, fried and served with syrup sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Cream Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Bring the milk to a boil in a saucepan.

  2. Add the sugar, butter, and vanilla extract.

  3. Thicken the mixture with cornstarch until it just drops from a spoon.

Shape and fry

  1. Spread the mixture on a baking sheet.

  2. Fry the fritters as you would prune fritters.

Serve

  1. Serve with syrup sauce.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  4. Butter + vanillatop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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 creamy base that the thickened mixture is built on.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps give the set mixture a tender, sweet flavour.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother mouthfeel.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk into a mixture firm enough to spread and hold its shape.

The step that matters

Thicken the mixture with cornstarch. Cornstarch swells when heated in liquid and sets the mixture. Too little leaves it runny and it will not hold its shape when fried; too much makes it stiff and pasty. Stop when it just drops from a spoon.

“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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