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Dessert

Cocoanut Pudding

A baked coconut pudding made with bread crumbs, milk, eggs, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Cocoanut 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 pudding

  1. Soak the preserved coconut in ½ cup of hot milk for a while.

  2. In a bowl, combine the soaked coconut, bread crumbs, milk, egg yolks, and sugar.

  3. Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) until set.

Top and brown

  1. Whip the egg whites until stiff and spread them on top of the pudding.

  2. Sprinkle with a little sugar and brown lightly in the oven.

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. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

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

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Bread crumbs
Provide the body that holds the pudding together and soaks up the milk.
Egg yolks
Set the custard as they cook, giving the pudding structure and richness.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks, they form a light topping that browns in the oven.
Milk
Supplies the liquid that softens the crumbs and bakes into a moist custard.
Preserved coconut
Adds coconut flavour and sweetness throughout the pudding.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps the topping take on light browning.

The step that matters

Whipping and spreading the egg whites. Egg whites must be whipped until stiff so the topping holds its shape and bakes into a light, airy layer. Under-whipped whites will sink or weep into the pudding.

“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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