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Dessert

Arrow-root Custards

A custard made with arrowroot, milk, eggs, and sugar, topped with meringue and dusted with powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Arrow-root Custards

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the custard

  1. Scald the milk in a saucepan.

  2. Mix the arrow-root with a little cold milk, then stir the mixture into the hot milk.

  3. Cook until thickened.

  4. Remove from heat.

  5. Stir in the beaten yolks and 2 tablespoons of sugar.

  6. Return to heat and stir for 2 minutes.

  7. Season to taste.

  8. Pour the mixture into custard cups.

  9. Place the cups in a pan of hot water.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven.

  2. Beat the egg whites to a meringue with the remaining 2 tablespoons of sugar.

  3. After 3 minutes in the oven, top the custards with meringue.

  4. Dust the custards with powdered sugar.

  5. Return to the oven to lightly color the meringue.

  6. Serve ice-cold.

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 + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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 liquid base of the custard and sets with the thickener and eggs.
Arrow-root
Thickens the hot milk into a smooth, tender custard as it gelatinises.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and help set the custard; whites whip into a meringue topping.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps the whipped egg whites hold their structure.

The step that matters

Return to heat and stir for 2 minutes after adding the yolks. Egg yolks can scramble if overheated, while too little heat leaves them thin. Gentle, steady stirring lets the yolks thicken the custard smoothly without curdling.

“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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