Name: Milk Diet
Ingredients: 1 pint of tea or coffee; 5 oz. of bread; 2 oz. of butter; ½ pint of milk; 12 oz. of semolina pudding; 12 oz. of rice pudding; 12 oz. of bread pudding; ½ pint of beef-tea (optional)

Why it works: Tea and rice work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 197 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Milk Diet

Ingredients

Directions

Breakfast

For breakfast, serve 1 pint of tea or coffee with 5 oz. of bread and 2 oz. of butter.
Alternatively, prepare boiled bread and milk with porridge and milk.

Dinner

For dinner on Sunday and Wednesday, serve ½ pint of milk with 12 oz. of semolina pudding.
On Monday, Thursday, and Saturday, serve ½ pint of milk with 12 oz. of rice pudding.
On Tuesday and Friday, serve ½ pint of milk with 12 oz. of bread pudding.
If preferred, substitute ½ pint of beef‑tea for the milk.

Supper

For supper, repeat the breakfast menu but omit the coffee.

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.

Tea + ricetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together197 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,374 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Rice + beeftop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,265 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread: Provides the solid base of the meal, soaked or served plain with the drink.
Milk: Adds moisture and softness, and is served with the pudding or bread.
Semolina pudding: Provides a soft, starchy dish for the dinner menu on set days.
Rice pudding: Provides a soft, starchy dish for the dinner menu on set days.
Bread pudding: Provides a soft, starchy dish for the dinner menu on set days.

“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.