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 ↓
Cream Pie
Ingredients
Directions
Make the filling
Stir together the sweet cream and powdered sugar in a bowl.
Let the mixture stand while you beat the egg whites until stiff.
Mix the beaten egg whites into the cream mixture thoroughly.
Add nutmeg or vanilla for flavor.
Assemble
Pour the filling into a large pie crust or two small pie crusts without an upper crust.
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.
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,920 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Egg + nutmegtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together24,744 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Sugar + nutmegtop 20% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together23,364 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg and nutmeg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 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
- Sweet cream
- Provides richness and body, setting the base texture of the filling.
- Powdered sugar
- Sweetens the filling and dissolves smoothly into the cream.
- Egg whites
- Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the filling and help it set.
The step that matters
Beating the egg whites until stiff. Egg whites hold air only when beaten to stiff peaks, and that trapped air gives the filling its lightness. Under-beaten whites collapse, and over-beaten whites turn dry and grainy, so the texture suffers either way.
“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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