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Dessert

Coffee Cream

A chilled coffee-flavored custard made with roasted coffee, milk, egg yolks, sugar, and gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream 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 ↓

Coffee Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the coffee infusion

  1. Roast the coffee berries in a small pan over medium heat, stirring constantly until light brown. Blow away burnt particles.

  2. Add the roasted coffee to a pan with boiling milk or cream. Cover and let steep.

  3. Strain the mixture through a napkin into a pan with egg yolks, sugar, and salt.

Make the cream

  1. Stir over low heat until it thickens.

  2. Once thickened, strain through a sieve into a large bowl.

  3. Mix in the whipped cream and gelatine.

  4. Pour into a mold set in ice.

Unmold and serve

  1. Once firm, dip the mold in warm water.

  2. Turn the cream out onto a dish.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Coffee + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Coffee + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,339 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Coffee + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,344 recipes

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

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Mocha coffee berries
Provide the main coffee flavour, which roasting and steeping draw into the cream.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they heat and add richness to the cream.
Milk or cream
Carries the coffee flavour and gives the cream its body and softness.
Sugar
Sweetens the cream and balances the bitterness of the coffee.
Whipped cream
Adds lightness and airiness, making the set cream softer.
Gelatine
Sets the cream so it holds its shape when turned out of the mold.

The step that matters

Stirring the custard over low heat. Egg yolks thicken as they warm, but if the heat is too high they can scramble and turn grainy. Gentle heat and constant stirring keep the custard smooth.

“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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