Name: Philadelphia Ice Cream
Ingredients: 1 quart evaporated cream; 2 quarts milk; 1½ pounds sugar; Flavoring of choice

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 ↓

Philadelphia Ice Cream

Ingredients

1 quart evaporated cream
2 quarts milk
1½ pounds sugar
Flavoring of choice

Directions

Make the base

Dilute the evaporated cream with the milk.
Add the sugar and stir until dissolved.
Strain the mixture and freeze.

Flavor

Add flavoring to taste.

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.

Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together77,875 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

Evaporated cream: Provides fat and richness, giving the ice cream a creamy body and smooth texture.
Milk: Dilutes the evaporated cream and adds liquid that freezes into a lighter, softer base.
Sugar: Sweetens the base and lowers its freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer and scoopable.

“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.