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Dessert

Cafe Parfait

A chilled coffee custard dessert made with egg yolks, sugar syrup, strong coffee, and whipped heavy cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Cafe Parfait

Why it works: Sugar and syrup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,842 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Cafe Parfait

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Combine the beaten egg yolks, sugar syrup, and strong coffee in a saucepan.

  2. Stir over low heat until the mixture thickens and coats the back of a spoon.

  3. Transfer the mixture to a bowl.

  4. Beat the mixture until it is cold and light.

Freeze

  1. Gently fold in the whipped heavy cream.

  2. Pour the mixture into a covered mold.

  3. Pack the mold in ice and salt for 4 hours.

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.

  1. Sugar + syruptop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Syrup + creamtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Syrup + coffeetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together318 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Coffee + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,339 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness as they set gently over low heat.
Heavy cream
Adds fat and airy lightness when whipped and folded in, softening the frozen texture.
Sugar syrup
Adds sweetness and keeps the frozen dessert from freezing too hard.
Strong coffee
Provides the main coffee flavor.

The step that matters

Stir over low heat until the mixture thickens. Egg yolks scramble if heated too quickly. Gentle heat thickens the custard smoothly, so it coats a spoon without curdling.

“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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