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Dessert

Prune Whip

A dessert made by reheating prunes, removing stones, beating with egg whites, and serving with cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Prune Whip

Why it works: Egg and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 24% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42,166 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Prune Whip

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the prunes

  1. Reheat the prunes in their juice over low heat, stirring constantly to prevent burning.

  2. When the fruit falls from the stones, remove from heat.

  3. Remove the stones and beat the prunes well.

Finish and serve

  1. Fold in the beaten egg whites until thoroughly mixed.

  2. Serve with plain or whipped cream.

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. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Prunes
Provide the main fruit flavour and body, softened into a thick pulp.
Egg whites
Whipped and folded in, they lighten the mixture and give it an airy, whipped texture.

The step that matters

Stirring the prunes over low heat. Constant stirring over low heat keeps the sugars and fruit pulp from scorching on the base of the pan, which would give a bitter, burnt taste.

“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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