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Dessert

Curd Cheesecakes

A baked cheesecake made with curds, butter, sugar, eggs, currants, and biscuit crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Biscuit and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 697 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Curd Cheesecakes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Cream the butter and sugar together.

  2. Add the mace or nutmeg, curds, beaten eggs, currants, and biscuit crumbs; mix well.

  3. Line tart tins with flaky pastry.

  4. Place a good spoonful of the mixture in each tin.

Bake

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for about 20 minutes.

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. Biscuit + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together697 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  2. Currant + macetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,791 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Butter + biscuittop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,009 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Sugar + biscuittop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Curds
Provide the main body of the filling, setting into a soft, rich custard-like texture.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the filling and carries flavour.
Eggs
Bind the filling and help it set firm as it bakes.
Castor sugar
Sweetens the filling and helps the creamed butter become light.
Currants
Add chewy pockets of sweetness and fruit flavour throughout the filling.

The step that matters

Placing the mixture in the pastry. A good spoonful in each tin should fill the pastry without overflowing. Too much filling can spill over and burn, while too little leaves the tart thin. Even portions help the tarts bake at the same rate.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, butter, currant, egg, biscuit, lemon):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, butter, currant, egg, biscuit, lemon. 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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