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Dessert

Swiss Trifle

A layered dessert of cream, flour, sugar, lemon, jam, biscuits, sherry, cherries, and angelica.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Swiss Trifle

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Mix the flour smoothly with a little cream.

  2. Heat the remainder of the cream.

  3. Add the sugar and grated lemon rind.

  4. Stir this mixture into the flour and cream.

  5. Cook gently for 5 minutes.

  6. When completely cool, stir in the lemon juice.

Assemble the trifle

  1. Cover the bottom of a glass dish with ratafias, macaroons, and jam.

  2. Soak with the sherry.

  3. Pour over half the cream.

  4. Add more biscuits, jam, and sherry.

  5. Cover with the remaining cream.

  6. Garnish with cherries and angelica.

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. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Lemon + sherrytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,273 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Cream
Forms the rich, smooth custard and the creamy topping of the trifle.
Fine flour
Thickens the custard as it cooks, giving it body.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the acidity of the lemon.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright flavour to the cooled custard.
Sherry
Soaks into the biscuits, adding moisture and flavour.
Macaroons
Soften as they soak, providing the base structure of the trifle.

The step that matters

Cooking the custard gently. Flour thickens only as its starch swells in hot liquid. Cooking gently and stirring keeps the mixture smooth and prevents lumps or scorching at the base of the pan.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, flour, sherry. 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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