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Dainty Pudding

A fruit bread pudding made with stale bread, citron, orange, eggs, and sugar, baked in buttered cups.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Dainty Pudding

six small cups

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Soften the grated stale bread in water.

  3. Mix the softened bread with chopped citron, orange rind, orange juice, egg yolks, and sugar.

  4. Butter six small cups.

Bake and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the bread mixture.

  2. Distribute the mixture into the buttered cups.

  3. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until brown.

  4. Serve hot with cream 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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Orange + breadtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,084 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Stale bread
Provides the body of the pudding, soaking up water and custard to hold its shape.
Egg yolks
Enrich the mixture and help it set into a tender, custard-like texture when baked.
Egg whites
Beaten until stiff and folded in, they add lift and a light, airy texture.
Citron
Adds chewy, candied fruit flavor and moisture to the pudding.
Orange
Its rind and juice add aroma and a bright citrus acidity.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stiff whites hold air that gives the pudding lift. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring vigorously deflates the foam and leaves a dense result.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Datesfits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, egg, sugar, butter. 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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