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Dessert

Italian Cream

A chilled custard made from cream, sugar, lemon juice, white wine, and gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and sugar 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 ↓

Italian Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixtures

  1. Divide the cream into two bowls.

  2. In one bowl, mix the sugar, lemon juice, and white wine.

  3. Add the other pint of cream and stir vigorously.

  4. Boil the isinglass or gelatin with the water until reduced to half.

Combine and set

  1. Stir the lukewarm mixture into the cream mixture.

  2. Pour into a glass dish and let it congeal.

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

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

  2. Lemon + white winetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Cream + white winetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,760 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Cream + lemontop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,640 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Cream
Supplies fat and richness, giving the dessert a smooth, creamy texture.
Powdered loaf sugar
Sweetens the dessert and balances the sharpness of the lemon.
Lemon juice
Adds sharp acidity that brightens the sweet, rich cream.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma that complement the lemon.
Isinglass or gelatine
Sets the cream into a firm dessert as it cools.

The step that matters

Stir in the gelatine mixture while it is only lukewarm. Gelatine sets as it cools. If the mixture is too hot, the cream can thin and separate. If the gelatine has already thickened, it can form lumps. The mixture must stay fluid enough to combine evenly and then pour before it sets.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Strawberryfits better
  3. Raspberryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, white wine. 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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