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Dessert

Spanish Cream

A chilled custard dessert made with gelatin, milk, egg yolks, sugar, and whipped egg whites, served with cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Spanish Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Soak the gelatin in cold milk.

  2. In a double boiler, combine the egg yolks, 1 pint of milk, sugar, and soaked gelatin, stir well and bring to a boil.

  3. Remove from heat and add flavoring to taste.

Set and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Fold the beaten egg whites into the custard.

  3. Pour the mixture into a buttered mold.

  4. Refrigerate until set.

  5. Serve with cream.

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

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the custard so it holds its shape when chilled.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness and colour.
Egg whites
Beaten to stiff peaks, they lighten the set dessert with air.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard and adds creaminess.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the richness of the yolks.

The step that matters

Folding the beaten egg whites into the custard. Whites deflate if stirred or overmixed, losing the air that makes the dessert light. Fold gently and quickly while the custard is still warm enough to stay fluid, so the mixture blends evenly before it sets.

“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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