Why it works: Egg and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Custard Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Make the custard
In a bowl, combine the egg yolks and milk, and season with coarse sea salt.
Pour the mixture into the pie crust and place it in the hot oven.
Once heated, move the pie to a moderate oven (350°F/175°C) to bake slowly and prevent curdling.
Make the meringue and finish
When the custard is set, beat the egg whites until frothy, then add sugar and spread over the top.
Return the pie to the oven to brown the meringue slightly.
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.
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg yolks
- Thicken the custard as they set, giving it a rich, smooth body.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid that the egg proteins set into a custard.
- Egg whites
- Whipped into a foam that forms the meringue topping.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the meringue and helps it stay glossy and stable.
The step that matters
Moving the pie to a moderate oven. Egg custard proteins set best with gentle heat. Staying at high heat can overcook the custard, making it curdle or weep, so the temperature must drop after the initial heating.
“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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