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Dessert

Cocoanut Cream Pie

A custard pie made with eggs, milk, sugar, shredded coconut, and topped with meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and coconut are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,648 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cocoanut Cream Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the custard

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Beat 3 egg yolks with 2 heaping tablespoons of sugar, then add 1 ½ pints of rich milk and mix well.

  3. Pour the mixture into a deep pie tin lined with pie crust.

  4. Sift in 2 tablespoons of shredded coconut and bake until the crust is done and the custard is set.

Top and serve

  1. Beat the 2 egg whites to a stiff froth, adding 1 heaping tablespoon of sugar and a few drops of rose or orange extract.

  2. Spread the meringue on top of the pie and sprinkle with sugar and additional coconut.

  3. Return to the oven and brown lightly.

  4. Serve cold.

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.

  1. Milk + coconuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,648 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  3. Coconut + rosetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together185 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Sugar and milk 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the milk custard so it sets firmly when baked.
Egg whites
Whip into a stiff foam that forms the light, airy meringue topping.
Rich milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, giving richness and a soft set.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and meringue and helps stabilise the whipped whites.
Shredded coconut
Adds coconut flavour and a little texture to the custard and topping.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites to a stiff froth. Whites must be whipped until they hold stiff peaks, with no trace of yolk or grease, or the meringue will be thin and may weep. Sugar added gradually helps the foam stay stable while it bakes and browns.

Swap the coconut

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Coconutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, milk, rose. 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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