Why it works: Sugar and cream 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 ↓
Raspberry Tarts, and Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Roll out the thin puff pastry and lay it in a tart pan.
Place the raspberries in the crust and sprinkle fine sugar over them.
Bake
Cover with a lid and bake until golden.
Fill and serve
Once baked, cut open the tart and fill it with cream, beaten egg yolks, and additional sugar.
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 + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together42,166 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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
- Thin puff pastry
- Forms the flaky, crisp base that holds the berries and filling.
- Raspberries
- Provide tart flavour and juicy moisture in the crust.
- Fine sugar
- Sweetens the raspberries and balances their tartness.
- Cream
- Adds richness and a smooth, soft texture to the filling.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich the cream filling with fat and flavour.
The step that matters
Bake with the lid on until golden. Covering the tart traps moisture released by the raspberries, so the pastry must still bake long enough to turn golden and crisp rather than soggy.
“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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