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Dessert

Orange Cream

A chilled orange-flavored custard made with milk, cream, gelatin, and orange zest and juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Orange Cream

Why it works: Gelatin and cream match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,628 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Orange Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Boil the milk with the rind of two oranges and the sugar.

  2. When slightly cool, add the milk mixture to the egg yolks.

  3. Return to the saucepan and stir over low heat until it thickens.

  4. Pour into a bowl and add the juice of the oranges.

Set and serve

  1. Fold in the whipped cream and the gelatin dissolved in a little boiling water.

  2. Mix thoroughly and pour into a wet mold.

  3. Serve with slices of orange colored with cochineal.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Gelatin + creamtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  4. Orange + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,696 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set on gentle heat and add richness.
Gelatin
Sets the mixture so it holds its shape when unmolded.
Double cream
Adds fat for a rich, smooth texture once whipped and folded in.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the citrus acidity.
Oranges
Rind gives aromatic oil to the milk; juice adds bright citrus flavour.

The step that matters

Stir over low heat until it thickens. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat; too much heat scrambles them into lumps, so the custard must be stirred continuously over low heat.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, gelatin, milk, 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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