Skip to main content
Dessert

Strawberry and Crumb Pudding

A baked pudding made with milk, eggs, sugar, nutmeg, strawberry jam, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Strawberry and Crumb Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

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

  2. Butter a pie dish.

  3. Spread a layer of strawberry jam at the bottom of the dish.

  4. Add a good layer of bread crumbs on top of the jam.

Make the custard

  1. In a saucepan, beat the eggs and stir in the sugar and nutmeg.

  2. Add the milk and stir over low heat until thickened.

  3. Pour the egg mixture gradually over the bread crumbs and jam.

Bake

  1. Bake for 30 minutes.

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

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

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

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

  3. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Nutmeg + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,997 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Thicken the custard and set the pudding as it bakes.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, giving a soft, creamy texture.
Bread crumbs
Soak up the custard to form the body of the pudding.
Strawberry jam
Adds fruity sweetness and flavour beneath the crumbs.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and adds to its flavour.

The step that matters

Add the milk and stir over low heat until thickened. Eggs thicken when heated gently; high heat can scramble them, leaving lumps instead of a smooth custard.

Swap the strawberry jam

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Strawberry jamthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, nutmeg, sugar, bread, 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.

You might also like

Bread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipesStrawberry Ice CreamStrawberry Ice Cream122 recipesSoft Ginger BreadSoft Ginger Bread85 recipesOrange Potato BreadOrange Potato Bread80 recipes