Name: Blamange Rubane, Or, Striped Blamange
Ingredients: 1 quart (or 2 quarts) of blamange; prepared spinach juice (for green color); liquid cochineal or carmine (for red color); strong infusion of saffron (optional); 3 or 4 fresh egg yolks; 1-2 tablespoons of milk; chocolate (for additional color); firm, clear isinglass or calf’s-foot jelly (optional); pure salad oil

Why it works: Spinach and saffron match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 149 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Blamange Rubane, Or, Striped Blamange

Ingredients

1 quart (or 2 quarts) of blamange
prepared spinach juice (for green color)
liquid cochineal or carmine (for red color)
strong infusion of saffron (optional)
3 or 4 fresh egg yolks
1-2 tablespoons of milk
chocolate (for additional color)
firm, clear isinglass or calf’s-foot jelly (optional)
pure salad oil

Directions

Prepare the colors

Prepare blamange in the usual way, making it a little firmer.
Divide the blamange into three or four equal portions.
Color one portion with spinach juice.
Color another portion with liquid cochineal.
Color a third portion with saffron infusion.
Color a third portion with egg yolks mixed with boiling blamange.
For chocolate color, mix boiled chocolate with a small amount of water.

Layer and set

Rub the insides of the molds with a drop of salad oil before pouring in the blamange.
Pour the different colored blamanges into a mold in half-inch layers, ensuring each layer is cool before adding the next.

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.

Spinach + saffrontop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together149 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,128 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Saffron + milktop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together319 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Spinach + eggtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,323 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks: Enrich the blamange and add a yellow tint when mixed in.
Chocolate: Adds brown color and a chocolate flavor to one layer.
Milk: Adds moisture and richness to the blamange.

The step that matters

Let each layer cool before adding the next. Pouring warm blamange onto a layer that is not yet set makes the colors bleed and blur the stripes. Each layer needs to firm up so the next one sits on top cleanly.

Swap the saffron

The recipe marks saffron as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (spinach, egg, milk, chocolate):

Cinnamonfits better
Nutmegfits better
Saffronthe original
Peppermintfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against spinach, egg, milk, chocolate. 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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Blamange Rubane, Or, Striped Blamange