Name: Marshmallow Ice Cream
Ingredients: 1 cup sugar; 2 cups double cream (whipped stiff); 2 cups milk; ½ pound marshmallows; ½ cup chopped nuts; ¼ cup chopped almonds; 2 teaspoons vanilla; ½ cup cherries

Why it works: Almond and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,961 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Marshmallow Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

In a saucepan, heat the milk and sugar until boiling, then remove from heat.
Allow the mixture to cool slightly, then add the marshmallows cut in half.
Once the mixture is completely cool, stir in the vanilla and cherries cut in halves.
Finally, fold in the whipped cream gently.

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.

Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,961 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,187 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
Nuts + almondtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together394 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Nuts + vanillatop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together638 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

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

Swap the nuts

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream, milk, almond, vanilla):

Pistachiofits better
Hazelnutfits better
Chestnutfits better
Nutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, milk, almond, vanilla. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.