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Dessert

Custard Ice Cream

A frozen dessert made from milk, sugar, flour, cream, egg, vanilla, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Custard Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Mix flour, sugar, and salt in a bowl.

  2. Add milk to the mixture and heat until thick.

  3. Stir in the slightly beaten egg and cook as for soft custard.

Chill and freeze

  1. Cool the mixture, then add cream and vanilla.

  2. Strain the mixture and freeze.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Flour
Thickens the base as its starch swells and sets when heated with the milk.
Egg
Its proteins set when gently cooked, thickening the custard and adding richness.
Milk
Provides the liquid base and milk solids that give the custard body.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and softens the texture of the frozen ice cream.
Thin cream
Adds fat, which makes the frozen ice cream smoother and richer.
Vanilla
Adds aroma that carries the flavor of the finished ice cream.

The step that matters

Cooking the egg into the custard. Egg proteins set at moderate heat and can scramble if the mixture boils or overheats. Cook gently and stir constantly so the custard thickens smoothly.

“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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