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Dessert

Ratafia Cream

A custard dessert flavored with brandy, almond essence, and fruit leaves, topped with whipped cream and colored sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar 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 ↓

Ratafia Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Boil the leaves in milk until flavored, then strain.

  2. Add cream and egg yolks, stirring over low heat until thick.

  3. Remove from heat and cool slightly.

Assemble and serve

  1. Half fill custard cups with the mixture.

  2. Top with whipped cream flavored with almond essence and brandy, sweetening to taste.

  3. Garnish with colored sugar.

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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Milk + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,738 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Cream + brandytop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,635 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Cream + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  5. Milk + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,800 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the cream as they set over low heat, giving the custard its body.
Cream
Provides richness and fat, giving a smooth, velvety texture.
Milk
Carries the flavor of the leaves and forms the base of the custard.
Laurel, peach, or nectarine leaves
Infuse the milk with an almond-like aroma during boiling.

The step that matters

Stirring the custard over low heat until thick. Egg yolks set at moderate temperatures and can curdle or scramble if overheated, so gentle low heat and constant stirring keep the custard smooth.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Walnutfits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Pecansfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against laurel, milk, cream, egg, brandy, sugar. 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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