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Dessert

A Richer Blancmange

A sweet milk dessert with almonds, spices, and rose water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,514 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

A Richer Blancmange

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Simmer 1½ pints of new milk with 1 ounce of isinglass, lemon rind, cinnamon, and mace until dissolved.

  2. Sweeten the mixture with 2½ ounces of loaf sugar.

  3. Blanch and pound the sweet and bitter almonds with 1 tablespoon of rose water. Mix the almonds with the milk.

Strain and set

  1. Strain the mixture through a linen sieve or new flannel into ½ pint of rich cream and stir thoroughly.

  2. Let the mixture stand for 1 hour.

  3. Pour into molds, leaving sediment behind.

  4. When nearly cold, refrigerate until set.

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. Cinnamon + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,514 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Milk + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Isinglass
Sets the liquid into a firm, wobbly gel as it cools.
New milk
Forms the liquid base that the isinglass sets into a creamy dessert.
Rich cream
Adds fat for a smooth, rich texture and a softer mouthfeel.
Loaf sugar
Sweetens the dessert and balances the almond flavour.
Sweet almonds
Contribute body and a nutty flavour to the milk base.

The step that matters

Straining into the cream and letting it stand. Straining removes the sediment and lemon rind so the set dessert is smooth. Letting it stand before molding allows remaining particles to settle, so pouring off the clear mixture keeps the texture clean.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, lemon, cinnamon, sugar, almond, rose, cream):

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, lemon, cinnamon, sugar, almond, rose, cream. 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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