Name: Pineapple Ice Cream
Ingredients: ½ lb tinned pineapple, rind removed; 1 cup milk; ½ pint cream; juice of 1 lemon; 6 oz sugar

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 ↓

Pineapple Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pineapple

Cut the pineapple into small pieces.
Bruise the pineapple in a mortar to extract the juice.

Make and freeze

Add the milk, cream, lemon juice, and sugar to the pineapple juice.
Strain the mixture through a sieve.
Freeze according to your ice cream maker's instructions.

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.

Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Pineapple + milktop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together885 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
Pineapple + lemontop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Pineapple: Supplies the main fruit flavour and the juice that forms the base.
Milk: Adds liquid and milk solids that give the base body and a creamy character.
Cream: Adds fat, which keeps the frozen ice cream smooth and rich.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the pineapple flavour.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and keeps the frozen texture softer by lowering the freezing point.