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Dessert

Marshmallow Pudding

A gelatin-based dessert made with egg whites, sugar, and optional color, fruit, or nuts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Marshmallow Pudding

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Marshmallow Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the gelatin

  1. Soak the gelatin in cold water for 5 minutes.

  2. Place the gelatin in a pan of hot water until dissolved.

Make the mixture

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  2. Fold in the sugar gradually.

  3. Add the hot water to the dissolved gelatin and mix with the egg mixture.

  4. Beat until stiff.

  5. Divide the mixture in half.

  6. Add pink food coloring and candied cherries to one half.

  7. Add whole pecans to the other half.

Set and serve

  1. Pour both mixtures into a mold and refrigerate until set.

  2. Serve with cream or whipped cream.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Egg + pecanstop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,280 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pecans + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together706 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Gelatine
Sets the liquid mixture into a firm, sliceable structure as it chills.
Egg whites
Whipped into foam, they give the pudding its light, airy texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps stabilize the whipped egg white foam.

The step that matters

Add the hot water to the dissolved gelatin and mix with the egg mixture. The gelatin must be fully dissolved and warm enough to blend smoothly, otherwise it can form strands or lumps instead of an even set. Mixing it in gently helps keep the whipped foam from deflating.

Swap the pecans

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pistachiofits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Pecansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, cream. 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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