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 ↓
Delicious Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the custard
Thicken one pint of milk with one-half cup of flour, and simmer ten minutes.
Add nearly a cup of sugar and a good half cup of butter; stir while hot until thoroughly mixed.
When half cold, add the beaten yolks of live eggs.
When entirely cold, add whites of eggs beaten to a stiff froth.
Flavor with lemon or vanilla.
Bake and serve
Bake in a two-quart dish as it rises a great deal.
Place in a pan of hot water in a quick oven for half an hour.
Serve with hard sauce flavored differently from pudding.
Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
| Ingredient | Portion assumed | kcal |
|---|---|---|
| Flour | 1 cup (125g) all-purpose | 455 |
| Milk | 1 cup (244ml) whole | 149 |
| Butter | 1 tbsp (14g) | 102 |
| Egg | 1 large egg (50g) | 78 |
| Sugar | 1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated | 49 |
One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.
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. See the original page.
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.
-
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
-
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
-
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
What each ingredient does
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that flour thickens into a pudding body.
- Flour
- Thickens the milk and gives the pudding its set structure.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a tender, smooth texture.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps balance the richness of the butter and eggs.
- Eggs
- Yolks enrich and set the custard; whites, beaten stiff, lighten it and help it rise.
The step that matters
Add the egg yolks only when the mixture is half cold. Yolks added to a very hot mixture can scramble and turn grainy, so the base should cool first. Whites are added only when fully cold so their beaten foam is not deflated.
“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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