Name: Miss Belknap
Ingredients: one pound of sugar; one pint of milk; a pinch of salt; two large lemons; eight eggs; three quarters of an hour in a moderate oven; salt

Why it works: Milk and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Miss Belknap

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

Mix the butter and sugar together.
Beat the eggs well, add a pinch of salt, grated rind and juice of the lemons.
Add the egg mixture to the butter-sugar mixture.

Bake and serve

Put in a pudding dish and bake three quarters of an hour in a moderate oven.
Use as pie filling or bake with an under crust.

By Keokuk (Iowa). Westminster Presbyterian church. 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. 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 + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together77,875 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together44,316 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Eggs: Set the pudding into a soft custard as they cook, giving it structure.
Sugar: Sweetens the pudding and helps create a smooth, tender texture.
Lemons: Add acidity and aroma from the rind and juice to balance the sweetness.

The step that matters

Baking the pudding. Eggs set gently in a moderate oven. Too much heat can overcook them, making the pudding grainy or watery.

Flavor stand-ins for the lemon

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

Vanillabetter flavor fit
Figabout as good a flavor fit
Raisinabout as good a flavor fit
Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, milk, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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.