Why it works: Sugar and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Bavaroise
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Chill 1 pint of cream in the ice for several hours until thoroughly cold.
Soak the gelatine in cold water for 2 hours.
Beat the egg yolks until creamy.
Make the custard
In a saucepan, heat 1 pint of cream with the sugar until boiling.
Pour the hot cream over the soaked gelatine and stir until dissolved.
Set aside to cool.
Once the cream mixture is cool, stir in the egg yolks briskly.
Strain the mixture into a bowl and add vanilla or rum to taste.
Chill the mixture in the ice.
Set and serve
Whip the other pint of chilled cream to stiff peaks and fold it into the cooled mixture gently.
Rinse 2 molds or 1 large mold with cold water and fill with the mixture.
Set aside to harden, then turn out and serve with cream or whipped cream sauce.
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.
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Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together35,032 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Cream + vanillatop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together12,301 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + vanillatop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together27,347 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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
- Heavy cream
- Provides richness and, whipped, the light airy body of the finished cream.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and thicken the custard base as they are gently heated.
- Gelatine
- Sets the cream so it holds its shape when turned out of the mold.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the cream and balances the richness of the yolks and cream.
The step that matters
Stirring the egg yolks into the cooled mixture. If the base is still hot, the yolks can scramble and curdle. Letting the cream cool first keeps the yolks smooth and evenly thickened.
“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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