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Dessert

Cherry Meringue Pudding

A chilled pudding of stewed cherries topped with macaroons and folded lemon‑egg‑white meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Cherry Meringue Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the cherries

  1. Pit and stew the cherries, sweetening and thickening them with cornstarch.

  2. Place the cherries in the bottom of a pudding dish and cover with a layer of macaroons.

Make the lemon custard

  1. Combine egg yolks, cornstarch, cold water, lemon juice, lemon rind, and sugar in a double boiler.

  2. Boil the mixture until thickened.

  3. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  4. Once the lemon mixture is cool, gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  5. Pour the lemon and egg white mixture over the cherries and macaroons.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until lightly browned.

  2. Serve very cold.

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. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  2. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

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

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

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

Lemon and sugar 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

Cherries
Provide the fruit base, sweetened and thickened so they hold their shape under the topping.
Egg yolks
Thicken the lemon mixture as it cooks and add richness to the custard.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they lighten the topping and set into a meringue when baked.
Cornstarch
Thickens the cherry filling and the lemon custard so they hold their body.
Lemons
Supply acidity and aroma from the juice and rind, balancing the sweetness of the sugar.
Sugar
Sweetens the lemon custard and helps stabilise the whipped egg whites.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. If the lemon mixture is still warm, it can deflate the whipped whites and thin the topping. Letting it cool first keeps the air in the meringue, so it rises and sets lightly when baked.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits about as well
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Datesfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, 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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