Name: Tapioca Custard
Ingredients: 1 cup milk; a pinch of salt; 1 egg; 1 tablespoon coconut; 1 tablespoon water; tapioca (soaked overnight)

Why it works: Milk and coconut are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,648 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Tapioca Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the tapioca overnight.
In a double boiler, heat the milk.
Add the soaked tapioca and salt, and cook until clear.
Stir in the beaten yolk of the egg, sugar, coconut, and cold water.
Cook for four minutes.
Beat the egg white and use it to top the custard.

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.

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.

Milk + coconuttop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,648 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg + coconuttop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,090 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).