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Dessert

Kentucky Cream

A frozen custard dessert made with boiled custard, gelatin, milk, raisins, strawberry preserves, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Raisin and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,781 recipes. Both carry 2-nonanone, which smells fruity, floral. The science ↓

Kentucky Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Prepare a rich boiled custard and sweeten to taste.

  2. Dissolve the gelatin in the cold milk.

  3. Let the custard cool, then pour it into a freezer.

Freeze and finish

  1. As soon as it begins to freeze, add the raisins, strawberry preserves, and whipped cream.

  2. Stir and beat well until it has the consistency of ice cream.

  3. Add blanched almonds, grated coconut, currants, or chopped citron if desired.

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. Raisin + almondtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Strawberry + almondtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Milk + strawberrytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,130 recipes

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

  5. Raisin + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Gelatin
Sets the mixture so the frozen dessert holds a smooth, firm texture.
Whipped cream
Adds fat and air, giving a lighter, creamier texture to the frozen dessert.
Raisins
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness throughout the dessert.
Strawberry preserves
Add sweetness, fruit flavor and some softness to the frozen mixture.

The step that matters

Stir and beat while it begins to freeze. Beating during freezing breaks up ice crystals and incorporates air, so the dessert becomes smooth rather than icy and dense. Adding the cream and preserves as freezing starts helps distribute them evenly.

Swap the raisin

The recipe marks raisin as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (gelatin, milk, strawberry, cream, almond, currant):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raspberryfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against gelatin, milk, strawberry, cream, almond, currant. 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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