Name: Foamy Sauce
Ingredients: 1 egg; ½ cup sugar; ½ cup milk; 2 teaspoons corn starch; vanilla extract

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 ↓

Foamy Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the egg and sugar

Beat the egg thoroughly in a bowl.
Add the sugar to the egg and beat until well combined.

Make the sauce

Scald the milk in a saucepan over medium heat.
In a small bowl, mix the corn starch with a little cold milk to form a slurry.
Add the corn starch mixture to the scalded milk and stir until thickened.
Remove from heat and add vanilla extract for flavor.

Serve

Just before serving, pour the hot thickened milk over the egg and sugar mixture, beating well to create a sweet foam.

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.

Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,187 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together35,032 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,943 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,955 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, 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

Egg: Adds richness and structure, and its proteins help trap air to form the foam.
Sugar: Sweetens the sauce and helps stabilize the beaten egg foam.
Milk: Forms the liquid base of the sauce and carries the flavor.
Corn starch: Thickens the scalded milk into a smooth sauce as it heats.