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Dessert

Peach Cabinet Pudding

A chilled peach custard pudding made with peaches, custard, gelatin, and beaten egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Sherry and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,209 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Peach Cabinet Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peaches

  1. Drain the peaches.

  2. Cut the peaches into quarters.

  3. Sprinkle the peaches with powdered sugar.

  4. Pour Sherry and brandy over the peaches.

Make the custard

  1. In a saucepan, make a custard by heating milk, egg yolks, sugar, and salt.

  2. Soak the gelatin in cold water.

  3. Add the soaked gelatin to the custard just before removing from heat.

  4. Strain the custard.

  5. When slightly cooled, add the liquor drained from the peaches.

  6. Stir the mixture until it begins to thicken.

  7. Fold in the beaten egg whites.

Assemble and chill

  1. Line a mold with the peaches.

  2. Pour the custard into the mold.

  3. Chill the pudding until set.

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. Sherry + brandytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Wine + brandytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Peach + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together781 recipes

    Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).

  4. Peach + sherrytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together48 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Peach + brandytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together339 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help it thicken as it heats.
Egg whites
Beaten and folded in to lighten the custard's texture.
Gelatine
Sets the custard so the pudding holds its shape when chilled.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard.
Peaches
Provide fruit flavour and moisture, lining the mold.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the fruit.

The step that matters

Add the soaked gelatin to the custard just before removing from heat. Gelatine must be fully dissolved and evenly mixed without overheating the custard. Boiling can weaken gelling strength and may curdle the egg yolks, so the custard should be hot enough to dissolve the gelatine but not allowed to boil.

Swap the peach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, sherry, wine, brandy, milk):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Applefits about as well
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, sherry, wine, brandy, 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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