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Dessert

Pistachio Cream Ice

A frozen custard dessert flavored with pistachios, almond liqueur, orange flower water, and spinach extract for color.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pistachio and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 693 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Pistachio Cream Ice

Ingredients

Directions

  1. While pounding the pistachio nuts, gradually add a little orange flower water.

  2. Once the custard is cold, mix in the noyau and a little spinach extract.

  3. When the mixture is partially frozen, stir in the pistachio nuts.

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. Pistachio + almondtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Pistachio + spinachtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together110 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Pistachio + nutstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together425 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Almond + spinachtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together352 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Almond + orangetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,125 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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 that freezes into a smooth, rich texture.
Pistachio nuts
Adds nutty flavor and a crunchy texture to the frozen cream.
Noyau (or almond liqueur)
Adds almond-like aroma and flavor that complements the pistachio.
Orange flower water
Adds a light floral aroma that rounds out the pistachio flavor.

The step that matters

Stirring in the pistachio nuts at partial freeze. If the mixture is fully frozen, the nuts cannot spread evenly and stay in large icy clumps. Adding them while it is only partly frozen keeps the solids suspended and distributed through the cream.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pistachio, nuts, almond, spinach):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Cherryfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pistachio, nuts, almond, spinach. 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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