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Transparent Pudding

A baked pudding made with butter, sugar, egg yolks, and West Indian preserves, finished with rose water or wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Transparent Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Beat the butter and sugar together until creamy.

  3. Whisk the egg yolks until very light.

Assemble and bake

  1. Layer the West Indian preserves in a dish, with or without pastry.

  2. Pour the butter, sugar, and egg yolk mixture over the preserves.

  3. Bake in the preheated oven until set, testing with a knife.

Finish

  1. Once done, ice the pudding and add rose water or wine for flavor.

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. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + rosetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,584 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Butter + rosetop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Adds richness and a tender, silky texture to the custard layer.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps create a smooth, creamy base when beaten with butter.
Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture as it bakes, setting it into a smooth, sliceable custard.
West india preserves
Provide the fruity sweetness and main flavour beneath the custard layer.

The step that matters

Baking until set. Egg yolks set through gentle heat; overbaking can make the custard curdle, weep or turn grainy, so testing with a knife until it is set matters.

“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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