Why it works: Milk and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Rennet Blanc-mange or Junket
Ingredients
Directions
Dissolve the sugar in the warmed milk.
When the milk is at the temperature of fresh milk, pour it into a serving bowl.
Stir in the rennet wine.
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 + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + winetop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,116 recipes
Shared aroma: sotolon (fenugreek, curry).
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Sugar + winetop 31% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together9,581 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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
- Milk
- Forms the base that the rennet sets into a soft, delicate curd.
- Rennet wine
- Contains rennet enzymes that coagulate the milk proteins so it sets.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness to the mild, set milk.
The step that matters
Stir in the rennet wine at the right temperature. Rennet enzymes work best at about body temperature. If the milk is too hot, the enzymes are destroyed and the milk will not set; if it is too cold, setting is slow and weak.
“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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