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Lemon Blancmange

A lemon-flavored custard dessert thickened with rice and gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Lemon Blancmange

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Lemon Blancmange

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Whisk the egg yolks with ½ pint of milk in a saucepan over low heat until thickened.

  2. Pour the thickened custard into a bowl.

Make the rice mixture

  1. Combine the remaining milk, ground rice, butter, lemon rind, and 3 oz. of sugar in another saucepan.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring constantly until thick.

  3. Pour the thick rice mixture into the bowl with the custard and mix well.

Add the gelatine and set

  1. Combine the gelatin with the remaining milk in a small saucepan and let sit by the fire to dissolve.

  2. Boil the gelatin mixture for 1–2 minutes.

  3. Stir the dissolved gelatin into the custard mixture, adding the remaining 3 oz. of sugar.

  4. Once cooled, mix in the strained lemon juice.

  5. Pour the mixture into a well‑oiled mold and refrigerate in a pan of cold water until set.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  3. Rice + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,366 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  4. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  5. Rice + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness and a smooth, set texture.
Ground rice
Thickens the milk and gives the blancmange body and a soft, light texture.
Gelatine
Sets the mixture so it holds its shape when chilled.
Butter
Adds fat for a rich, smooth mouthfeel.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright lemon flavour that balances the sugar.

The step that matters

Adding the lemon juice after cooling. Acidic juice added while the mixture is still hot can thin the custard and weaken its set. Letting it cool first helps the gelatine and starches set firmly and keeps the texture smooth.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, rice, sugar, butter):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

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

“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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