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Dessert

Cream Ices

A chilled dessert made from milk, cream, egg yolks, sugar, and preserved fruit.

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 ↓

Cream Ices

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs.

  2. Add the milk when nearly boiling, then return to the heat and stir until it thickens without boiling.

Flavor and color

  1. Strain the mixture, add the sieved jam or fruit pulp, and sweeten to taste.

  2. Brighten the color with a few drops of carmine, saffron, or spinach greening, depending on the fruit used.

Finish and freeze

  1. Let the preparation cool, then fold in the stiffly whipped cream.

  2. Freeze the mixture as directed for about an hour.

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. Milk + strawberrytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cream + strawberrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the milk into a smooth custard base as they gently set with heat.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the yolks thicken into a custard.
Cream
Adds richness and a light, smooth texture when folded in whipped.
Preserved fruit or jam
Supplies the main fruit flavor, some acidity, and color in the finished ice cream.
Sugar
Adds sweetness, adjusted to taste against the tart fruit.

The step that matters

Stir the custard without letting it boil. Egg yolks thicken gently with heat, but boiling can curdle them into grainy lumps that do not smooth out again. Stir steadily over low heat until the custard coats a spoon.

Swap the strawberry

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberrythe original
  3. Raspberryfits about as well
  4. Figfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, cream, egg, 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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