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Dessert

Syllabub

A frothy dessert made from cream, sweet wine, brandy, sugar, lemon juice, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Syllabub

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syllabub

  1. Combine the cream, sweet wine, brandy, sifted sugar, and lemon juice in a bowl.

  2. Whisk the mixture well.

  3. Remove the froth with a spoon.

  4. Place the froth on a large sieve.

Serve

  1. Fill glasses three-quarters full with the liquid.

  2. Top the glasses with the froth.

  3. Sprinkle grated nutmeg over the froth.

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Wine + brandytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  4. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Wine + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,157 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Heavy cream
Forms the body of the dessert and whips into the light froth on top.
Sweet wine
Adds sweetness and flavour, and its acidity balances the rich cream.
Brandy
Adds aroma and warmth, and helps the mixture taste fuller.
Sifted sugar
Sweetens the mixture, and sifting helps it dissolve smoothly into the cream.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps thicken the cream slightly.

The step that matters

Whisking and skimming the froth. The cream must be whisked enough to hold a stable froth, but not so far that it turns grainy or buttery. Lifting the froth off promptly keeps it light and separates it from the liquid below.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, wine, brandy, sugar, nutmeg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, wine, brandy, sugar, nutmeg. 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.

More syllabub recipes

Whipped 15Staffordshire 7Lemon 6Birthday 3 See all 113 →

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