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Dessert

Cream Custard

A custard made with cream, butter, egg yolks, sugar, and finely grated bread crumb, baked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cream Custard

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the custard

  1. Grate the crumb of a baker's loaf very fine.

  2. In a pot, combine the grated bread, cream, butter, and egg yolks.

  3. Add sugar to taste and heat the mixture over low heat until it thickens.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into shallow custard dishes.

  2. Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven for 30 minutes.

  3. Grate loaf sugar over the custards before serving.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

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 set with gentle heat, giving it richness and a smooth body.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, giving the custard a soft, tender texture.
Butter
Adds fat, contributing richness and a smooth mouthfeel to the custard.
Crumb of a baker's loaf
Provides starch and body, helping the mixture thicken and hold its structure.

The step that matters

Heat the mixture over low heat until it thickens. Egg yolks set at moderate temperatures and can scramble if heated too fast. Gentle, low heat with steady stirring keeps 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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