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Dessert

Almond Blanc-mange

A chilled almond dessert made with milk, gelatin, blanched almonds, rose water, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and rose are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,465 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Almond Blanc-mange

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the gelatine

  1. Soak the gelatine in 1 cup of milk for 1 hour.

Make the blanc-mange

  1. Heat the remaining milk to boiling.

  2. Add the soaked gelatine to the boiling milk.

  3. Mix in the pounded almonds and stir for 10 minutes.

  4. Add the sugar and stir until dissolved.

  5. Strain the mixture through a muslin bag to remove almond bits.

Set and chill

  1. Wet a mould with cold water.

  2. Pour the mixture into the mould.

  3. Refrigerate until firm.

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. Almond + rosetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,465 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Milk + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,800 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  4. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Rose + sugartop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,584 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Milk
Forms the liquid base that the set custard is made from.
Gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, sliceable body as it cools.
Blanched almonds
Provide the main flavour and a fine, creamy texture once strained.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the flavour of the almonds and milk.

The step that matters

Adding the soaked gelatine to the boiling milk. Gelatine must dissolve fully into the hot milk, and the mixture should not be boiled hard afterward, since prolonged boiling can weaken gelatine's setting power and leave lumps or a grainy texture.

“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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