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Dessert

Apricot Blanc-mange, or Crême Parisienne

A chilled apricot-flavored custard dessert made with isinglass, milk, cream, sugar, apricot jam, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Apricot Blanc-mange, or Crême Parisienne

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Dissolve the isinglass in the milk or cream and strain it through muslin.

  2. In a saucepan, combine the strained mixture with sugar and bring to a boil.

  3. Stir in the rich cream gradually.

Finish and set

  1. Add the mixture to the apricot jam by spoonfuls, mixing smoothly.

  2. Stir until nearly cold to prevent the jam from sinking.

  3. Add lemon juice to enhance the flavor.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Milk + apricottop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together826 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Apricot + lemontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,098 recipes

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

  4. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Isinglass
Sets the cream mixture into a delicate, wobbly gel as it cools.
Rich cream
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety texture to the set dessert.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and balances the tartness of the apricot jam.
Apricot jam
Provides the apricot flavour, colour and fruity sweetness.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the apricot.

The step that matters

Stir until nearly cold before setting. If the jam mixture is still warm and thin, the denser apricot jam settles to the bottom instead of staying evenly distributed. Stirring while the mixture cools thickens it enough to hold the fruit in suspension.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, cream, apricot):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Peachfits better
  3. Strawberryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, cream, apricot. 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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