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Dessert

Swiss Trifle

A layered dessert of lemon‑flavored cream and macaroons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,950 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Swiss Trifle

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cream custard

  1. Combine the lemon rind and cinnamon in ¾ pint of cream and heat beside the fire for 30 minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture.

  3. Sweeten with sugar.

  4. In a clean saucepan, bring the cream to a boil.

  5. Mix the reserved ¼ pint of cream with flour to form a smooth batter.

  6. Add the batter to the boiling cream.

  7. Simmer for 3-4 minutes, stirring constantly.

  8. Remove from heat and let cool.

  9. Gradually stir in the strained lemon juice.

Layer and serve

  1. Layer macaroons in a glass dish.

  2. Pour in part of the cream.

  3. Add more macaroons.

  4. Top with the remaining cream.

  5. Garnish with thinly cut candied citron.

  6. Make this dish 12 hours before serving.

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. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Cinnamon + flourtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Rich cream
Forms the body of the custard and gives it a rich, smooth texture.
Fine flour
Thickens the cream into a smooth custard when cooked with heat.
Lump sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the lemon acidity.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright flavour that cuts the richness of the cream.
Macaroons
Soak up the custard as they sit, giving the trifle its soft layers.

The step that matters

Adding the batter to the boiling cream. Flour must be stirred in smoothly and cooked for several minutes while simmering, or it stays lumpy and tastes raw. Constant stirring prevents scorching and lumps.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, sugar, cinnamon, flour):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Blueberryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, cinnamon, flour. 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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