Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Bread and Butter 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
Spread butter on the slices of stale bread.
Layer the bread in a deep pudding dish, sprinkling currants or raisins between layers until the dish is two-thirds full.
Soak and bake
In a bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar, and milk.
Pour the egg mixture over the bread layers and let it stand for 2 hours.
Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 1.5 hours.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Currant + milktop 16% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together5,475 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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Butter + curranttop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,856 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Stale bread
- Its dry, open crumb soaks up the custard and holds the pudding's structure.
- Eggs
- Egg proteins set as the custard bakes, giving the pudding its firm, sliceable body.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid that moistens the bread and forms the custard with the eggs.
- White sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the custard brown lightly on top as it bakes.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, which carries flavor and helps the top brown.
The step that matters
Letting the custard stand before baking. The bread needs time to absorb the egg and milk mixture. If it bakes too soon, dry spots stay unsoaked and the pudding can turn out patchy and uneven in texture.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, egg, sugar, milk):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Coconutfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, sugar, milk. 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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