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Dessert

Burnt Almond Cri&AM

A custard dessert with toasted almonds, Kirsch, and cream, chilled before serving.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Burnt Almond Cri&AM

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the custard according to the recipe for Cream Ices.

  2. In a saucepan, heat the cream and add the Kirsch.

  3. Stir in the loaf sugar until dissolved.

  4. Toast the almonds until golden brown, then chop them.

Combine and chill

  1. Combine the custard, cream mixture, and chopped almonds.

  2. Chill the mixture before serving.

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

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

  3. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Custard
Forms the creamy base of the dish, giving body and a smooth, rich texture.
Cream
Adds fat and richness, contributing moisture and a smooth mouthfeel.
Loaf sugar
Provides sweetness and, once heated, dissolves to flavour the cream mixture.
Almonds
Add toasted, nutty flavour and a crunchy texture against the smooth custard.

The step that matters

Toast the almonds until golden brown. Almonds darken quickly in the heat, and once they pass golden they turn bitter and burnt. Pulling them at the right colour gives a nutty, toasted flavour rather than a scorched one.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Hazelnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, 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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