Why it works: Sugar and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Bavarian Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the strawberries
Pick and crush the strawberries with a silver spoon.
Sprinkle sugar over the strawberries and let them stand for a few hours.
Rub the strawberries through a fine sieve.
Make the cream
In a saucepan, combine the strawberry puree and new milk.
Add the isinglass and heat the mixture to melt the isinglass.
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.
-
Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 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
- Strawberries
- Provide the main flavour and colour, and their pulp gives the cream body.
- Isinglass
- Acts as a gelatine-like setting agent that firms the cream as it cools.
- New milk
- Forms the creamy base that the strawberry puree and isinglass are set into.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the strawberries and softens their tartness.
The step that matters
Melting the isinglass. Isinglass must be fully dissolved into the warm mixture before it cools. If it is not heated enough, it will not dissolve evenly and the cream may set unevenly or in specks.
“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 bavarian cream recipes
You might also like
White Cake431 recipes
Pound Cake373 recipes
Orange Bundt Cake349 recipes
Spice Cake344 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.