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 ↓
Baked Indian 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 the pudding
Scald the milk and add salt.
Stir in the cornmeal and ginger, then let it stand for 20 minutes.
Mix in the molasses, eggs, and butter.
Bake
Pour the mixture into a baking dish.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 2 hours.
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Ginger + walnuttop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together737 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
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Ginger + molassestop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,116 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Butter + walnuttop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,832 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
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Milk + walnuttop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,236 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Yellow cornmeal
- Thickens the milk into a soft, spoonable pudding as it cooks and stands.
- Molasses
- Adds sweetness, deep color, and a rich caramel-like flavor.
- Eggs
- Help set the pudding and give it a custard-like structure as it bakes.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the cornmeal thickens and the eggs set.
The step that matters
Letting the cornmeal stand. Cornmeal needs time to absorb liquid and swell before baking. Resting it for the stated 20 minutes lets the starch hydrate, so the pudding bakes to an even texture instead of staying grainy or loose.
Swap the ginger
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, molasses, egg, butter, walnut):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Allspicefits about as well
- Gingerthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, molasses, egg, butter, walnut. 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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