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Dessert

Kinnaird Ice Pudding

A chilled almond and cream pudding made with roasted almonds, sugar, egg yolks, and boiled cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Kinnaird Ice Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the almonds

  1. Blanch the almonds and bitter almonds, then dry them.

  2. In a sugar boiler, roast the almonds over a slow fire until light in color.

  3. Add the sugar and stir until melted and light brown.

  4. Remove from heat and stir until cool, then pound the mixture.

Make the custard

  1. Combine with egg yolks, sugar, and boiled cream.

  2. Stir over low heat with a wooden spoon until the eggs are set.

  3. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve and freeze.

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. Almond + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  3. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Almonds
Provide the main nutty flavor and body of the pudding base.
Bitter almonds
Add a concentrated almond aroma that sweet almonds alone do not give.
Sugar
Sweetens the base and, when caramelized, adds a deeper toasted flavor.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set and enrich its texture.
Boiled cream
Adds fat and richness, giving a smooth, creamy mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Stir the custard over low heat until the eggs are set. Egg yolks thicken at gentle heat but scramble if overheated, leaving a grainy texture. Keeping the heat low and stirring constantly lets the custard thicken smoothly before it is strained and frozen.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits less well
  4. Pecansfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, 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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