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 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Drain the liquid from the corn and chop the kernels finely.
In a bowl, stir together the milk, beaten eggs, melted butter, chopped corn, sugar, salt, and pepper.
Pour the mixture into a buttered pudding dish.
Bake and serve
Place the dish in an outer pan filled with scalding water.
Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until set and browned.
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 into a firm, sliceable pudding as they cook.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that makes the pudding creamy and moist.
- Corn
- Provides the main body and sweet flavor of the pudding.
- Melted butter
- Adds richness and moisture to the custard.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the top brown in the oven.
The step that matters
Bake in a water bath. The outer pan of scalding water insulates the custard so it heats gently. Eggs that cook too fast turn grainy or curdle, so the pudding sets evenly and stays smooth.
“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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