Why it works: Banana and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,470 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓
Banana Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Slice the sponge cake.
In a glass dish, layer the cake and sliced bananas alternately.
Make a soft custard with milk, sugar, and wine, then pour it over the layers.
Beat the egg whites until stiff and spread them over the top.
For a variation, add scalded peaches that have been left in sugar to a sweet, thick custard.
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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Banana + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,470 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Banana + winetop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together244 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + winetop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,116 recipes
Shared aroma: sotolon (fenugreek, curry).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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
Swap the banana
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sugar, egg, wine):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Applefits about as well
- Bananathe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, egg, wine. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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