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Dessert

Rush Cream Cheese

A cheese made by curdling cream and milk in rushes or wheat straw, pressed with a weight.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Rush Cream Cheese

Why it works: Milk and wheat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,418 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Rush Cream Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine equal parts of cream and new milk, or use two-thirds cream and one-third new milk.

  2. Create a vat from rushes or wheat straw sewn together in a brick shape without a top or bottom.

  3. Make two squares from the same material: one for the base and one to cover the vat.

Press and turn

  1. Press a half-pound weight on top of the vat.

  2. The next day, turn out the cheese and change the rushes daily when turning.

  3. Ensure fresh rushes are used each time you turn the cheese.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + wheattop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  2. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

  3. Cream + wheattop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together681 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Cream
Provides the fat that gives the cheese its rich, soft texture.
New milk
Supplies the milk solids and proteins that set into the curd.
Fresh rushes or wheat straw
Forms the mold and draining vat that shape the cheese as it drains.

“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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