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Dessert

Burnt Custard

A custard made with egg yolks, milk, sugar, vanilla, topped with stiffly beaten egg whites, browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Burnt Custard

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs with the powdered sugar until very light.

  2. Heat the milk in a saucepan until it boils, then gradually add it to the beaten eggs.

  3. Set the mixture over low heat, stirring constantly until thickened, but do not let it boil.

  4. Remove from heat, stir for a few minutes, and add the vanilla.

  5. Let the custard cool completely, then pour it into a deep glass dish.

Top and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites with the powdered sugar until stiff, then spread over the custard.

  2. Brown the top with a salamander or broiler, then 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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  5. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set with gentle heat, giving it a rich body.
Egg whites
Whip into a stiff foam that forms the topping, which browns under the broiler.
Powdered white sugar
Dissolves easily into the yolks and whites, sweetening the custard and helping the meringue hold its shape.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, which thickens when the egg proteins set.

The step that matters

Thicken the custard over low heat without boiling. Egg yolks set between about 160 and 180°F and curdle or turn grainy if overheated. Stirring constantly over low heat spreads the heat evenly, so the custard thickens smoothly.

“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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