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Dessert

Quince Blanc-mange,

A chilled quince dessert made with quince juice, isinglass, sugar, cream, and molded with oil or water.

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

Quince Blanc-mange,

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Dissolve isinglass in the quince juice over a clear fire for 20-30 minutes until it jellies when falling from a spoon.

  2. Remove any scum carefully.

  3. Gradually pour the boiling jelly into the thick cream, stirring briskly until nearly cool.

  4. Pour the mixture into a mould rubbed with a small amount of salad oil or dipped in cold water.

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

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

  2. Quince + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,444 recipes

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

  3. Quince + creamtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together203 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Isinglass
Sets the liquid into a firm, wobbly jelly as it cools.
Quince juice
Provides the flavour and the liquid base that the isinglass sets.
Thick cream
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy texture to the set dessert.
Sugar
Sweetens the blancmange and balances the tartness of the quince.

The step that matters

Stirring the jelly into the cream until nearly cool. Isinglass sets as it cools, so pouring the boiling jelly in gradually and stirring briskly keeps the cream evenly distributed. If the mixture cools too much before it is poured, it can set unevenly or in lumps.

Swap the quince

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Quincethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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