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Dessert

Eggless Ice Cream

A frozen dessert made from milk, cream, flour, sugar, and vanilla, without eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Eggless Ice Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. In a custard kettle, heat 3 pints of milk over simmering water.

  2. Mix flour with 1 pint of milk until smooth, then stir into the hot milk.

  3. Cook for 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

  4. Add sugar and stir until dissolved.

  5. Remove from heat and strain through a fine mesh strainer while hot.

Freeze

  1. Once cooled, add 1 quart of cream and place in a freezer.

  2. When half frozen, stir in 1 pint of whipped cream flavored with vanilla.

  3. Pack and freeze until firm.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  4. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Whole milk
Forms the liquid base and its milk solids add body and richness to the custard.
Heavy cream
Adds fat, which keeps the frozen ice cream smooth and rich rather than icy.
All-purpose flour
Its starch thickens the hot milk into a custard, giving the ice cream body.
Granulated sugar
Sweetens the custard and lowers its freezing point, keeping the ice cream softer.
Vanilla extract
Adds aroma and flavor to the cream folded in.

The step that matters

Mix the flour into milk until smooth before adding it to the hot milk. Dry flour clumps when it meets hot liquid, because the outside of each particle thickens before the inside hydrates. Mixing it smooth in cool milk first lets the starch disperse evenly, so the custard stays lump-free.

“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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