Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓
Cheap Ice Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Make the base
Dissolve the farina in 1 part of the milk.
Mix the dissolved farina with the remaining milk and sugar.
Simmer the mixture over low heat without boiling.
Cool and freeze
Allow the mixture to cool.
Freeze the cooled mixture.
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.
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + corntop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together7,168 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar 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
- Farina or corn starch
- Thickens the milk mixture so the finished ice cream is smooth and creamy rather than icy.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid base and dairy fat that give the ice cream its body and richness.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and lowers the freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer when frozen.
The step that matters
Simmer without boiling. Starch thickens best when heated gently. Boiling can break down the starch's thickening power and scorch the milk, leaving a thin or grainy base.
“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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