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Dessert

Caramel Pie

A custard pie with caramelized sugar, egg yolks, milk, vanilla, butter, and cornstarch, baked in a pie crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Caramel Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Mix cornstarch, salt, and brown sugar in a bowl.

  2. Pour scalding milk over the mixture and cook for a few minutes.

  3. Remove from heat and stir in the beaten egg yolks.

  4. Return to heat, using an asbestos mat, and stir constantly until thickened.

  5. Just before removing from heat, add butter and vanilla extract.

Assemble and brown

  1. Bake a pie crust and pour the custard into it.

  2. Cover with stiffly beaten egg whites and brown in the oven.

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. Vanilla + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,050 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and enrich its texture as they set with heat.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk mixture into a smooth, sliceable custard when heated.
Light brown sugar
Adds caramel sweetness and flavor to the custard.
Butter
Adds fat for a rich, smooth mouthfeel and flavor.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the starch thickens into custard.
Egg whites
Whipped to form a stiff topping that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Return to heat and stir constantly until thickened. Cornstarch needs to reach a boil and be stirred continuously to gelatinize evenly; stopping early leaves a thin custard, while letting it sit on the heat can scorch the sugar and milk on the bottom of the pan.

“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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