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Dessert

Cooperstown Pudding

A custard pudding made with flour, cornstarch, milk, eggs, butter, and salt, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Cooperstown Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Mix flour and cornstarch with a little milk.

  2. Stir the mixture into boiling milk and let it cool slightly.

Finish the batter

  1. Add salt, beaten egg whites, and yolks.

  2. Incorporate butter.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a pudding dish placed in a pan of water.

  2. Serve with sauce.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Thickens the milk and gives the pudding body and structure as it cooks.
Cornstarch
Adds thickening power so the pudding sets with a smoother, softer texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that gives the pudding its moisture and creamy flavor.
Eggs
Set during baking to give the pudding its firm, custard-like structure.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender, velvety mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Bake in a water bath. Placing the dish in a pan of water keeps the heat gentle, so the egg proteins set slowly without curdling or turning grainy.

“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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