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Savoury Custard

A steamed custard made from eggs, beef tea, butter, and salt.

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

Why it works: Beef and tea work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 417 recipes. Both carry 2-methyl-3-(methyldithio)furan, which smells thiamin, meat. The science ↓

Savoury Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Whisk the yolks and white of egg together in a bowl.

  2. Stir in the cold beef tea.

  3. Butter a cup or small jar lightly and pour in the mixture.

  4. Cover with a slightly buttered paper.

Steam and serve

  1. Place the jar in a pan of boiling water, ensuring the water comes halfway up the jar.

  2. Steam for about 20 minutes without shaking the jar.

  3. Serve warm or cold.

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. Beef + teatop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together417 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methyl-3-(methyldithio)furan (thiamin, meat).

  2. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Tea + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together703 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Egg + beeftop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Yolks and white set into a tender custard as they cook gently.
Beef tea
Supplies the liquid and savory flavor that the eggs set within.
Butter
Lightly greasing the cup keeps the custard from sticking when it is turned out.

The step that matters

Steam without shaking the jar. Eggs set into a delicate gel as proteins coagulate with gentle heat. Shaking or rapid boiling can break up the forming structure, leaving the custard rough or watery.

“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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