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Dessert

Apricot Plombiere

A French dessert of apricot marmalade, custard, and whipped cream set in a mold with ice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Apricot Plombiere

Ingredients

Directions

Make the marmalade

  1. Make a marmalade by cooking apricots and sugar over low heat until soft.

  2. Puree the mixture until smooth.

Make the custard

  1. In a separate bowl, stir egg yolks and cream over low heat until thickened.

Combine and set

  1. Combine the marmalade with whipped cream and sugar to taste.

  2. Add the custard to the mixture and mix well with isinglass.

  3. Set the mixture in a plain mold surrounded by pounded ice.

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. Apricot + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,630 recipes

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Apricot + creamtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,116 recipes

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

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

Apricots
Provide the main fruit flavour and body for the marmalade base.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness and a smooth texture.
Isinglass
Gelatin-like setting agent that firms the mixture as it chills.
Whipped cream
Adds lightness and a creamy, airy texture to the mixture.
Sugar
Sweetens the fruit and balances its acidity.

The step that matters

Stirring the egg yolks and cream over low heat. Egg proteins thicken gently but can scramble if the heat is too high, leaving a grainy custard. Low heat and constant stirring keep it smooth.

Swap the apricot

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Strawberryfits better
  4. Apricotthe original

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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