Skip to main content
Dessert

Floating Island

A dessert of meringue floating on custard, flavored with lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Floating Island

Why it works: Lemon and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Floating Island

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gelatine base

  1. Soak the gelatine in water for 20 minutes.

  2. Add sugar and heat on the stove until boiling.

  3. Once nearly cold, mix in beaten egg whites, lemon juice, and lemon rind.

  4. Pour the mixture into a mold.

Make the custard

  1. Combine egg yolks, milk, and cornstarch in a saucepan.

  2. Sweeten to taste.

  3. Cook until thickened.

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. Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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 mixture so it holds its shape when cold.
Egg whites
Beaten into the mixture to add lightness and airy structure.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness and colour.
Milk
Forms the body of the custard and adds creaminess.
Cornstarch
Thickens the custard as it heats, giving it a smooth, set texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the gelatine mixture and balances the lemon's acidity.

The step that matters

Mix in the beaten egg whites once the mixture is nearly cold. If the mixture is still warm, the beaten egg whites can deflate and lose their foam. If it is too cold, the gelatine may already be setting in lumps, so the whites will not blend evenly.

Swap the lemon

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

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

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

More floating island recipes

Apple 3Strawberry 3 See all 214 →

You might also like

Lemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipesLemon SherbetLemon Sherbet103 recipesLemon CustardLemon Custard64 recipes