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Dessert

Queen of Puddings

A custard pudding with strawberry topping and meringue.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Queen of Puddings

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.

Make the base

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, rub the butter into the bread crumbs.

  3. Beat the egg yolks with the sugar until creamy.

  4. Add the milk to the egg mixture and stir well.

  5. Pour the mixture into a baking dish.

  6. Bake until the custard is set.

  7. Let it cool.

Top and brown

  1. Mash the strawberries with sugar.

  2. Spread the mashed strawberries over the pudding.

  3. Beat the egg whites with sugar until stiff.

  4. Spread the stiff egg whites over the pudding.

  5. Brown the meringue in the oven.

Make the sauce

  1. For the sauce, beat the sugar and butter until creamy.

  2. Add the hot milk to the sauce.

  3. Add the beaten egg to the sauce, mixing well.

  4. Flavor the sauce with vanilla.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Fine bread crumbs
Forms the bulk of the pudding and soaks up the custard to create a soft base.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches the crumbs and gives a tender, moist texture.
Egg yolks
Thicken the milk as they set, giving the custard its richness and body.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps the egg whites whip into a stable meringue.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the egg proteins set into a creamy custard.
Strawberries
Add a fruity layer with bright acidity and flavour under the meringue.

The step that matters

Bake the custard until just set. Egg proteins firm as they heat. Overbaking makes the custard grainy and weepy, so it should be removed once set and cooled before the toppings go on.

“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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