Why it works: Sugar and cream 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 ↓
Ice Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Make the custard
Beat the eggs and sugar together until well combined.
Add the milk and heat the mixture in a kettle of boiling water, stirring thoroughly but do not boil.
Let the mixture cool in a cool place.
Finish and freeze
Once cooled, add the cream and flavor to taste.
If using, prepare the pineapple by grating or cutting it into small pieces and sweetening it; let it sit for a few hours.
Combine the pineapple with the ice cream mixture and freeze.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Milk + pineappletop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together885 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together29,399 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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
- Eggs
- Thicken the base as they set gently with heat, giving the ice cream a creamy custard body.
- White sugar
- Adds sweetness and softens the texture by lowering the freezing point of the mixture.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base of the custard and supplies milk solids for flavor and body.
- Cream
- Adds fat, which makes the frozen ice cream smoother and richer.
The step that matters
Heating the milk mixture without boiling. Heating gently thickens the egg custard while keeping it smooth. If it boils, the eggs can scramble and turn grainy, so stir thoroughly and watch closely.
Swap the pineapple
The recipe marks pineapple as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, sugar, cream):
- Vanillafits better
- Strawberryfits better
- Raspberryfits better
- Pineapplethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, sugar, cream. 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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