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Arrowroot Pudding

A baked pudding made with arrowroot, milk, egg, sugar, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Arrowroot Pudding

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Arrowroot Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the custard

  1. Mix the arrowroot with a small amount of cold milk.

  2. Pour the mixture into the boiling milk while stirring well.

  3. Add the sugar and the yolk of the egg, mixing thoroughly.

  4. Whip the egg white to stiff peaks and gently fold it into the mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a small buttered pudding dish.

  2. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 8 to 10 minutes.

  3. Serve immediately.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Arrowroot + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together817 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Arrowroot
Thickens the hot milk into a smooth, set custard without clouding it.
Egg
Yolk enriches and sets the custard; whipped white adds lightness and airy texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the arrowroot thickens and the egg sets.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the mild flavor of the pudding.

The step that matters

Adding the arrowroot mixture to the boiling milk. Arrowroot must be stirred in smoothly while the milk is boiling so it thickens evenly; lumps form if it is added to milk that is not hot enough or not stirred well.

Swap the arrowroot

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Sweet potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Arrowrootthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, 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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