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Dessert

Preserved Ginger Pudding

A steamed or baked pudding made with butter, flour, milk, eggs, sugar, and chopped preserved ginger.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Preserved Ginger 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 base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan over low heat.

  2. Gradually stir in the flour until combined.

  3. Slowly mix in the boiling milk while stirring continuously.

Add eggs and ginger

  1. Add the beaten egg yolks, chopped preserved ginger, and its syrup, along with the sugar.

  2. Whisk the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the mixture.

Cook and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a mold and steam for 1½ hours.

  2. Alternatively, bake in a dish lined with puff pastry for 30 minutes at 350°F (175°C).

  3. Serve hot or cold.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 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 + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + gingertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,564 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Eggs
Egg yolks thicken the custard and whipped whites lighten the pudding as it sets.
Flour
Flour combined with melted butter forms a roux that thickens the milk into a body for the pudding.
Butter
Butter adds richness and fat, giving the pudding a tender texture and smooth mouthfeel.
Preserved ginger
Ginger provides a sharp, spicy aroma and flavour that contrasts with the sweet custard.
Milk
Milk forms the liquid base that sets with egg and flour into a soft, creamy pudding.

The step that matters

Folding in the whisked egg whites. Whites beaten until stiff trap air that gives lift. Overmixing or deflating them while folding makes the pudding dense instead of light.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Jalapenofits better
  4. Gingerthe original

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