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Dessert

Creme Patissiere, or Pastry Cream

A thickened custard made from flour, egg yolks, and optional flavorings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and biscuit match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 889 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Creme Patissiere, or Pastry Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Gradually add the beaten yolks of the eggs to the flour.

  2. Stir briskly until well combined.

  3. Gently boil the mixture for 2-3 minutes, stirring continuously until thickened.

Finish and store

  1. If desired, substitute with crushed ratifias, macaroons, or stale biscuit.

  2. Add more lemon to taste if desired.

  3. Allow to cool; it can be stored for a long time.

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. Flour + biscuittop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together889 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + biscuittop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,643 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Fine flour
Thickens the cream as it cooks with the egg yolks.
Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture and add richness and a smooth body when heated.

The step that matters

Gently boil the mixture while stirring continuously. Egg yolks and flour thicken the cream only when heated enough, but the yolks can scramble if the mixture catches on the base or boils too hard. Constant stirring keeps the heat even and the texture 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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