Name: Custard Pie
Ingredients: 2 eggs; 3 tablespoons sugar; ½ teaspoon salt; 1½ cups milk; Nutmeg, for sprinkling; Pie crust

Why it works: Milk and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,685 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Custard Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Beat the eggs slightly in a bowl.
Add the sugar, salt, and milk to the eggs and mix well.
Line a pie plate with the crust and create a fluted rim.
Strain the egg mixture into the crust.
Sprinkle a few gratings of nutmeg on top.

Bake

Bake in the preheated oven to set the rim, then reduce the heat to 300°F (150°C) and continue baking until fully cooked.

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.

Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,685 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Egg + nutmegtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together24,744 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together77,875 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + nutmegtop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together23,364 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Egg and nutmeg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 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

Eggs: Set the custard as they cook, giving the filling its structure.
Milk: Provides the liquid base that the eggs thicken into a creamy custard.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps soften the custard's texture.

The step that matters

Bake in the preheated oven to set the rim, then reduce the heat to 300°F (150°C) and continue baking until fully cooked.. Egg custard sets gently as its proteins coagulate; high heat for too long can curdle or toughen it and leave the crust overbrowned, while too little heat leaves the center runny.