Why it works: Lemon and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,927 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Lemon 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 custard base
Grate the yellow zest from the lemon and squeeze out the juice.
In a saucepan, bring 2 cups of boiling water to a boil.
Mix the corn starch with a little cold water until smooth.
Add the corn starch mixture to the boiling water and stir until it thickens.
Stir in the grated lemon zest and lemon juice.
Beat the egg yolks and whites separately.
Stir the beaten yolks into the corn starch mixture.
Add the sugar and mix well.
Pour the mixture into a baking dish.
Bake and serve
Beat the egg whites with the remaining sugar and spread on top.
Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until light brown.
Let cool, then refrigerate and serve cold.
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.
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Lemon + corntop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,927 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together44,316 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Corn + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together7,168 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
- Corn starch
- Thickens the boiled liquid into a smooth, set custard.
- Eggs
- Enrich the custard and, as whipped whites, form a light topping that browns in the oven.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps the meringue topping stay glossy and brown.
- Lemon
- Zest adds aroma and juice adds the sharp acidity that balances the sweetness.
The step that matters
Stir the beaten yolks into the thickened starch. Adding yolks to very hot starch can scramble them. Cooling the mixture slightly before stirring in the yolks keeps the custard smooth.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (corn, sugar, egg):
- Vanillafits better
- Coconutfits about as well
- Raisinfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against corn, sugar, egg. 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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