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Dessert

Caramel Mousse

A chilled dessert made from caramel syrup, egg yolks, vanilla, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Caramel Mousse

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Make a caramel syrup by combining ¾ cup sugar and ¾ cup boiling water.

  2. Pour the caramel syrup carefully over the 6 well-beaten egg yolks.

  3. Cook the mixture over boiling water until it coats a spoon.

  4. Strain the mixture into a saucepan or tin basin.

  5. Set the saucepan into ice water.

  6. Stir constantly until the mixture is cold.

  7. Add 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract.

Finish and freeze

  1. Fold in 1 pint of whipped heavy cream carefully.

  2. Turn the mixture into a mold.

  3. Pack the mold in equal parts of ice and coarse sea salt.

  4. Let the mixture stand for 3 to 4 hours.

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 + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Vanilla + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,301 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  4. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  5. Egg + vanillatop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together27,347 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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 as they cook and add richness and a smooth, creamy body.
Heavy cream
Whipped into the base to add air and a light, silky texture.
Sugar
Caramelized into the syrup to add sweetness and a deep, toasty flavor.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture over boiling water until it coats a spoon. Egg yolks thicken as they heat, but overheating can scramble them into lumps. Cooking gently over simmering water until the custard coats a spoon gives a smooth base 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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