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Dessert

Blancmange

A chilled almond dessert thickened with isinglass and egg whites, sweetened with saccharin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Blancmange

Why it works: Egg and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,645 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Blancmange

Ingredients

Directions

Make the blancmange

  1. Dissolve the isinglass in boiling water.

  2. Scald the almonds in the water and remove them.

  3. Allow the water to cool slightly, then add the beaten egg whites and saccharin.

  4. Strain through a fine sieve and pour into a mold.

Serve

  1. Once cold, turn it out and decorate with blanched sweet almonds.

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. Egg + almondtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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, jelly-like structure as it cools.
Egg whites
Beaten whites add foam and light texture to the set dessert.

The step that matters

Allow the water to cool slightly before adding the egg whites. If the liquid is still very hot, the beaten egg whites can lose their foam and cook or collapse, weakening the light texture. Cooling it slightly keeps the whites airy while the mixture still stays liquid enough to strain and pour.

“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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