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Dessert

A Dutch Rice Pudding

A Dutch Rice Pudding is a baked rice custard with milk, cinnamon, eggs, butter, cream, sugar, nutmeg, lemon peel, and puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

A Dutch Rice Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Cook the rice

  1. Soak the rice in warm water for 30 minutes, then drain it.

  2. Combine the rice, milk, and cinnamon in a saucepan.

  3. Simmer until tender.

Make the filling

  1. Once cooled, mix in the beaten eggs, melted butter, cream, sugar, nutmeg, and lemon peel.

Bake

  1. Line a mold or dish with puff pastry.

  2. Pour the mixture into the pastry-lined mold.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until set.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Rice + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Rice + teatop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together197 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Cinnamon + teatop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

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 they cook, giving the pudding its firm body.
Rice
Forms the bulk of the pudding and thickens it as the starch softens in the milk.
Milk
Provides the liquid that cooks the rice and gives the pudding its creamy base.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the top brown lightly during baking.

The step that matters

Bake until set. Egg proteins coagulate as they heat, so the custard firms up. Underbaking leaves it runny, while overbaking makes the eggs curdle and turn grainy.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, cinnamon, egg, butter, tea, sugar):

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Cardamomfits about as well
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Clovefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, cinnamon, egg, butter, tea, sugar. 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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