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Iced Biscuits a LA Thackeray

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Strawberry and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,385 recipes. Both carry p-vinylguaiacol, which smells spicy, fruity. The science ↓

Iced Biscuits a LA Thackeray

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Mix the syrup and egg yolks, then strain the mixture.

  2. Add the strawberry pulp and vanilla sugar, and set the mixture as directed.

  3. Gently fold in the whipped cream.

  4. Fill paper cases with the mixture, using either circular or square shapes.

  5. Surround each case with a stiff paper band that extends half an inch above the edges, securing it at one corner.

  6. Place the filled cases in an ice cave, embedding them in ice.

  7. Before serving, remove the paper bands and cover the surfaces with brown ratafias, crushed to a fine powder.

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. Strawberry + vanillatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,385 recipes

    Shared aroma: p-vinylguaiacol (spicy, fruity).

  2. Syrup + sugartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  5. Syrup + creamtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Vanilla and sugar 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

Swap the strawberry

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

  1. Strawberrythe original
  2. Raspberryfits about as well
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Peachfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against syrup, egg, vanilla, sugar, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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