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Dessert

Pineapple Sherbet

A chilled pineapple dessert made with sugar, lemon juice, flour, egg whites, cream, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Pineapple Sherbet

Why it works: Sugar and cream 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 ↓

Pineapple Sherbet

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Mix sugar and flour in a bowl.

  2. Add ½ cup warm water and blend well.

  3. Pour in 1 quart of boiling water.

  4. Boil the mixture.

  5. Let the mixture cool.

Freeze

  1. Add the lemon juice, grated pineapple, and remaining water.

  2. Freeze the mixture until partly frozen.

  3. Fold in the whipped egg whites and cream.

  4. Continue freezing.

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  2. Lemon + pineappletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Sugar
Provides sweetness and keeps the frozen sherbet soft rather than hard.
Lemons
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the sweetness.
Grated pineapple
Supplies the main fruit flavour and moisture to the sherbet.
Flour
Thickens the base, giving the frozen sherbet a smoother body.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff foam, they add air and a light, airy texture.
Cream
Adds fat that makes the sherbet richer and creamier on the tongue.

The step that matters

Folding in the whipped egg whites and cream. Stiff egg whites hold air that gives lightness. If the mixture is too warm or is stirred hard, the foam deflates and the sherbet turns dense and icy. Fold gently and freeze promptly.

Swap the pineapple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, lemon, flour, egg, cream):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Pineapplethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, lemon, flour, egg, cream. 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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