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Dessert

Burnt Cream

A custard made with cream, milk, rice flour, egg yolks, vanilla sugar, and cinnamon, baked until browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,287 recipes. Both carry 4-methoxybenzaldehyde, which smells sweet, anise. The science ↓

Burnt Cream

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the custard

  1. Mix the rice flour or cornflour smoothly with a little milk.

  2. In a saucepan, combine the remaining milk, cream, and 1 oz of vanilla sugar; bring to a boil.

  3. Add the rice flour mixture and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring gently.

  4. Remove from heat and whisk in the well-beaten egg yolks, stirring by the side of the fire until thickened, but do not let it boil.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered soufflé dish.

  2. Sprinkle the surface lightly with cinnamon and thickly with vanilla sugar.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 10-15 minutes until the top is well browned.

  4. If the oven is not hot enough, hold the dish under a salamander 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. Vanilla + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  2. Rice + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  4. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  5. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Vanilla and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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.
Cream
Adds fat and richness, giving the custard a smooth, velvety texture.
Rice flour or cornflour
Starch that thickens the milk and cream into a stable custard base.
Vanilla sugar
Sweetens the custard and, as the topping, caramelises to form the burnt crust.

The step that matters

Do not let the custard boil after adding the egg yolks. Egg yolks scramble and turn grainy if overheated, so the custard must be stirred over gentle heat only until it thickens.

“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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