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Dessert

Dessert Ice

A chilled custard dessert made from rice, milk, cream, eggs, meringue, fruit, and liqueur.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Dessert Ice

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the rice

  1. Gently boil the rice until half done, then drain.

  2. In a stew-pan, combine the rice, boiling milk, sugar, and boiling cream. Stir well.

  3. Simmer until the rice is fully cooked.

  4. Let it cool.

Prepare the fruit

  1. Mince the mixed dessert fruits and moisten with maraschino or noyau.

  2. Set aside on a plate.

Make the custard

  1. Strain the milk and cream from the rice, adding enough milk to fill your chosen mold.

  2. Turn it into a custard by mixing in the eggs.

  3. Place the custard in a freezing pail surrounded by ice.

  4. Stir with a spatula until nearly frozen.

Add the meringue and finish

  1. Make a meringue by heating sugar with a little water until nearly boiling.

  2. Whip in the egg whites while continuing to whip until cool.

  3. Add the rice and meringue to the nearly frozen custard. Stir well.

  4. Incorporate whipped cream, minced fruit, and liqueur.

  5. Stir and freeze a little longer.

  6. Fill your ice mold and bury it in ice until ready to serve.

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. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  2. Apricot + gingertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together341 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

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

  4. Rice + gingertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,196 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Milk + coffeetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Rice
Gives the ice cream its body and a soft, creamy texture as it cooks in milk and cream.
Eggs
Thicken the custard base and add richness and structure as it freezes.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that cooks the rice and carries the custard's flavour and smoothness.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and softens the texture by lowering the freezing point.
Whipped cream
Adds fat and air, making the frozen result lighter and smoother.
Egg whites
Whipped into the meringue to add airy volume and a light texture.

The step that matters

Stir the custard while it nearly freezes. Stirring keeps ice crystals small and the texture smooth; letting it freeze still makes large, icy crystals that make the ice cream grainy.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Gingerthe original
  4. Peppermintfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, sugar, coffee, cream, egg, apricot. 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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