Why it works: Milk and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Italian Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Make the custard
Soak the gelatin in ½ cup cold milk for 30 minutes.
Boil 1 quart of milk in a saucepan.
Stir in the beaten egg yolks and sugar when the milk is boiling.
Add the soaked gelatin and stir until the custard thickens.
Set and chill
Remove from heat and pour into a deep dish with the beaten egg whites. Mix well and add flavoring to taste.
Pour into molds and refrigerate for 4 hours to cool.
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.
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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
- Gelatine
- Sets the liquid custard into a firm, sliceable body as it cools.
- Egg yolks
- Thicken the custard and add richness and colour.
- Egg whites
- Whipped to stiff froth, they lighten the mixture and give it an airy texture.
- Milk
- Forms the creamy base that the custard is built on.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the custard and balances the richness of the yolks and milk.
The step that matters
Stirring the custard until it thickens. Egg yolks can curdle or scramble if the custard is overheated, so it should be stirred gently over moderate heat until it coats a spoon. The gelatin is added only after thickening so it sets evenly in the chilled mold.
“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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