Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓
Corn 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Prepare and mix
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
In a bowl, mix corn kernels, eggs, milk, melted butter, sugar, salt, and pepper.
Pour the mixture into a greased baking dish.
Bake
Bake for 30-40 minutes until set and golden on top.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Corn + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,324 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Set the custard as their proteins coagulate, giving the pudding its firm structure.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base of the custard and keeps the pudding moist.
- Corn kernels
- Provide the main body of the pudding, along with natural sweetness and starch.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a tender, smooth texture.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the top turn golden as it bakes.
The step that matters
Bake until just set. Egg proteins set as the custard heats, and overbaking pushes them too far, making the pudding dry, spongy, or grainy. Pull it out once the centre barely wobbles and the top is golden, since it firms further as it cools.
“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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