Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Pudding Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
In a bowl, cream together the sugar and butter.
Add the flour and mix until smooth.
Stir in the beaten egg white.
Gradually add the boiling water, stirring well.
Flavor to taste.
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.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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
- White sugar
- Provides sweetness and, creamed with butter, helps give the sauce a light texture.
- Butter
- Adds fat and richness, carrying flavor and smoothing the sauce's mouthfeel.
- Flour
- Thickens the sauce as its starch swells in the hot liquid.
- Egg white
- Adds body and some structure to the sauce as it is stirred in.
- Boiling water
- Supplies the liquid that dissolves the sugar and turns the mixture into a pourable sauce.
The step that matters
Gradually add the boiling water, stirring well. Adding hot liquid slowly while stirring keeps the flour from clumping. Dumping it in at once can leave lumps that stay in a flour-thickened sauce.
“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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