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Drink

Tea Ice

A cold tea beverage made by infusing tea in cream, then mixing with eggs and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Tea Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Infuse the tea

  1. Tie the tea in a piece of muslin.

  2. Boil the muslin with tea in the cream.

  3. Once the infusion is strong, remove the muslin and squeeze it well.

Finish the ice

  1. Mix the infused cream with the eggs and sugar.

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

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

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

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

  3. Tea + creamtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together463 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Tea + sugartop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,204 recipes

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

Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Tea
Gives the cream its main flavour and aroma.
Cream
Provides fat and richness, giving the ice a smooth, creamy body.
Eggs
Add richness and help the mixture set into a smooth, custard-like base.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and softens the texture of the frozen ice.

The step that matters

Remove the muslin at the right strength. Tea leaves left steeping in hot cream keep releasing tannins, which make the infusion bitter. Removing the muslin once the flavour is strong, then squeezing it, keeps the taste balanced and captures the liquid.

“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.

More tea ice recipes

Cream 18Green Cream 5

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