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Dessert

A Curd Pudding

A dessert made by boiling milk, adding wine, curd, butter, sugar, flour or crackers, eggs, nutmeg, citron, then baking and serving with butter, sugar, wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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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 ↓

A Curd Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the curd

  1. Heat 2 quarts of milk in a pot until it boils.

  2. Pour in ½ cup of white wine and strain the curd from the whey.

Mix and bake

  1. Pound the curd in a mortar with 6 ounces of butter, ½ pound of loaf sugar, and ½ pint of rice flour or crushed crackers.

  2. Beat 6 eggs until light and mix them with the curd mixture and ½ grated nutmeg.

  3. Bake in saucers in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C).

Finish and serve

  1. Carefully turn out the puddings onto a dish.

  2. Stick thin slices of citron in them.

  3. Pour on rich melted butter, sugar, and wine.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  3. White wine + buttertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Rice + nutmegtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Butter + winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten eggs add structure and lightness as they set in the oven.
Milk
Curdled milk forms the soft curd that gives the pudding its body.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the pudding a tender, moist texture.
Rice flour or crushed crackers
Absorbs moisture and helps the curd hold its shape as it bakes.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the pudding brown lightly at the surface.

The step that matters

Turn out the puddings carefully. The baked puddings are soft and delicate while still warm, so they can break or tear if handled roughly. Letting them cool slightly before turning them out helps them keep their shape.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Thymefits less well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, white wine, butter, sugar, rice, egg, wine. 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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