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Dessert

French Tea Cream

A chilled custard flavored with tea, sweetened with sugar and thickened with gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

French Tea Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Make the tea cream

  1. Scald the cream in a saucepan.

  2. Remove from heat and stir in the tea.

  3. Cover and let steep for 6 minutes.

  4. Strain.

  5. In a double boiler, combine the strained cream with the beaten eggs and sugar.

  6. Stir until thickened like custard.

  7. Remove from heat.

  8. Add the soaked gelatine, stirring until dissolved.

  9. Strain into a wetted mold.

Chill and serve

  1. Refrigerate until firm.

  2. Serve with whipped cream.

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. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  3. Cream + teatop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together463 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  4. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Tea + sugartop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,204 recipes

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

Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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
Provides richness and body, and carries the tea flavour through the dessert.
Eggs
Thicken the custard as they cook gently, giving the cream a set, smooth texture.
Gelatine
Sets the liquid cream so it holds its shape when chilled in the mold.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the tannin bitterness of the tea.
Tea
Infused into the hot cream to add its aroma and flavour.

The step that matters

Stir the custard over gentle heat until it thickens. Eggs thicken by gentle heat; if the mixture gets too hot it can curdle or scramble, leaving a grainy texture instead of a smooth custard. A double boiler keeps the heat steady.

“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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