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Batter Pudding

A steamed or baked pudding made from flour, milk, eggs, salt, cream of tartar, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Batter Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the batter

  1. Mix the cream of tartar with the flour.

  2. Dissolve the salt and baking soda in a little of the milk.

  3. Gradually stir the remaining milk into the flour to form a smooth batter and beat well.

  4. Beat the egg yolks until thick and frothy.

  5. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  6. Combine the yolks and whites, then fold into the batter.

  7. Butter a pudding mold and prepare a kettle of boiling water.

  8. Beat the dissolved salt and baking soda into the batter, then pour it into the mold.

Cook

  1. Place the mold in the kettle and boil for 2 hours without stopping.

  2. Alternatively, bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour at 350°F (175°C).

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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  5. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

Flour and milk 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

Flour
Provides the starch structure that sets the pudding as it cooks.
Eggs
Whites trapped by beating lighten the batter and help it set into a tender body.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and adds moisture and richness to the pudding.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter and stabilizes the beaten egg whites.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acid in the batter to produce gas that helps it rise.

The step that matters

Folding the whites into the batter. Overmixing or deflating the beaten egg whites knocks out the air that lightens the pudding, so fold gently until just combined.

“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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