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Dessert

Rum Cream

A custard made with milk or cream, sugar, bay leaf, egg yolks, gelatin, and rum, set in a mold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and rum work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 967 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Rum Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Boil the milk or cream with the sugar and bay leaf.

  2. Pour the mixture onto the beaten egg yolks and stir over low heat until thick.

  3. Remove the bay leaf.

  4. Let the custard cool. Stir occasionally.

Prepare the gelatine

  1. Soak the gelatin in cold water.

  2. Dissolve the gelatin by boiling.

  3. Let the gelatin cool.

Set and serve

  1. Mix the cooled gelatin and custard together thoroughly.

  2. Add the rum.

  3. Pour the mixture into a mold.

  4. Let it stand for 12 hours.

  5. Unmold the custard.

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. Milk + rumtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together967 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Sugar + rumtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,908 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

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

  4. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Milk or cream
Provides the liquid base and richness for the custard.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set when gently heated, giving it body.
Gelatine
Sets the liquid so the rum cream holds its shape when unmolded.
Rum
Adds its distinctive flavour and aroma to the cream.

The step that matters

Stir the egg yolk mixture over low heat. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat, but if they get too hot they scramble and turn grainy. Low heat and steady stirring keep the custard smooth.

“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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