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Drink

Coffee Milk

A hot beverage made by boiling ground coffee in milk, clarified with isinglass, and sweetened with Lisbon sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Coffee Milk

Why it works: Coffee and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,202 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓

Coffee Milk

Ingredients

Directions

Make the coffee milk

  1. Boil the ground coffee in the milk for 15 minutes.

  2. Add the isinglass and let it boil for a few minutes.

Clarify and serve

  1. Set aside to cool and let it clarify.

  2. Sweeten with real Lisbon sugar before serving.

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. Coffee + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,202 recipes

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

  2. Coffee + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,344 recipes

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

  3. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 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

Milk
Forms the body of the drink and carries the coffee flavour.
Ground coffee
Supplies the main flavour and aroma of the drink.
Isinglass
Acts as a fining agent that helps the liquid clear as it settles.
Lisbon sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the bitterness of the coffee.

The step that matters

Add the isinglass and let it boil for a few minutes. Isinglass is a collagen-based fining agent. It works by binding suspended particles so they can settle out, which clears the liquid. Adding it too early or boiling it too hard can cause it to break down and fail to clear the drink properly.

“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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