Why it works: Carrot and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Carrot 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
Boil the carrot until tender.
Make the filling
Bruise the carrot and mix it with bread crumbs, egg yolks, egg whites, cream, ratafia, orange-flower water, nutmeg, and loaf sugar.
Bake and serve
Line a shallow dish with pastry and pour the mixture in.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) until set.
Turn out the pudding and sprinkle sugar over it.
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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Carrot + orangetop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together737 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
-
Carrot + nutmegtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,424 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
-
Orange + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,746 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
-
Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
-
Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,920 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Carrot
- Provides the bulk and body of the pudding, with a soft, moist texture once cooked and bruised.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich the custard and help it set firm when baked.
- Egg whites
- Add lightness and help bind the mixture as it sets in the oven.
- Cream
- Adds richness and moisture, giving the pudding a smooth, tender interior.
- Bread crumbs
- Absorb liquid and help give the pudding a soft, sliceable structure.
- Loaf sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and contributes to browning on the surface.
The step that matters
Bake until set. Eggs set as their proteins coagulate with heat. Pulling the pudding too early leaves it runny, while overbaking makes it dry and rubbery.
Swap the carrot
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, egg, cream, orange, nutmeg, sugar):
- Sweet potatofits better
- Spinachfits about as well
- Capsicumfits about as well
- Carrotthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against bread, egg, cream, orange, nutmeg, 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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