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Princess Cabbage

A baked cabbage pudding made with milk, butter, eggs, pepper, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Princess Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Boil the cabbage in water for 15 minutes, then drain and add fresh boiling water.

  2. Boil until tender, then drain and let cool.

  3. Chop the cabbage finely.

Make the pudding

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped cabbage with milk or cream, butter, beaten eggs, pepper, and salt.

  2. Pour the mixture into a buttered pudding dish and bake until brown.

  3. Serve hot.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

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

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the bulk of the pudding and gives it its body and mild flavour.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set on baking, giving the pudding its structure.
Milk or cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the pudding tender as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the top brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Drain the cabbage well after boiling and cooling. Excess water left in the chopped cabbage dilutes the custard, so the pudding may not set firmly and can turn watery.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, butter, egg, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, egg, pepper. 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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