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Dessert

Peach Pudding

A baked dessert of peaches topped with a milk, egg, lard, and flour batter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and peach work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 781 recipes. Both carry phellandrene, which smells minty. The science ↓

Peach Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA steady oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a steady oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Beat the eggs until light.

  3. Add the milk, melted lard, salt, and flour, and whip together for one minute.

  4. Drain and wipe the peaches.

  5. Lay the peaches in a buttered pudding dish.

Bake

  1. Pour the batter over the peaches and cover the dish.

  2. Bake for 45 minutes.

  3. Uncover and brown lightly.

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. Milk + peachtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together781 recipes

    Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).

  2. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + peachtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together787 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Eggs
Provide structure and richness as the batter sets during baking.
Flour
Gives the batter body so it bakes into a set, tender pudding.
Milk
Supplies the liquid that forms the batter and adds moisture to the pudding.
Melted lard
Adds fat, which contributes tenderness and richness to the pudding.
Peaches
Provide fruit flavor and moisture that soften and sweeten as they bake beneath the batter.

The step that matters

Uncover and brown lightly. Covered baking traps steam, so the top stays pale. Uncovering at the end lets dry heat brown the surface, but leaving it too long can dry or scorch the top.

Swap the peach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, flour):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, 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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