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 ↓
Lemon Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the pudding
Combine cake crumbs, lemon juice, and sugar in a bowl.
Add the beaten egg yolks and mix well.
Pour the boiling milk over the mixture and stir in the butter.
Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.
Steam and serve
Steam the mixture for 2 hours.
Serve with sauce.
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Egg + buttertop 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).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cake crumbs
- Form the body of the pudding and soak up the liquid as it steams.
- Lemon juice
- Adds sharp acidity that brightens the sweetness and flavour of the pudding.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps balance the tartness of the lemon.
- Eggs
- Yolks enrich and bind the pudding, while whites set and lighten its texture.
- Milk
- Provides moisture and softens the crumbs into a tender, custard-like mixture.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a smoother mouthfeel.
The step that matters
Gently fold in the beaten egg whites. Beaten egg whites trap air, which gives the pudding its light texture. Stirring them vigorously knocks out that air, leaving the pudding dense.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, milk, butter):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Coconutfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, milk, 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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