Why it works: Milk and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. 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.
Prepare the base
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Beat the yolks of 2 eggs well.
Mix the yolks with ½ cup milk, ½ cup sugar, 1 cup bread crumbs, and the grated rind of 1 lemon.
Bake the mixture until set.
Top and brown
Remove from the oven and spread with jelly.
Beat the whites of 2 eggs and mix in the juice of 1 lemon.
Spread the egg white mixture over the jelly.
Return to the oven for a few minutes to brown.
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.
-
Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
-
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
-
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,053 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together53,532 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
-
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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
- Egg yolks
- Enrich and bind the crumb base so it sets when baked.
- Bread crumbs
- Provide the body of the pudding, absorbing the milk and sugar to form a soft structure.
- Egg whites
- Whipped to form a light meringue topping that browns in the oven.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the base and helps the meringue topping brown.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the pudding and topping.
The step that matters
Baking the base until set. Bake until the base is firm but not dry. Underbaked yolks stay runny and will not hold the jelly and meringue layers, while overbaking makes the crumb tough and dry.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, sugar, bread):
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits better
- Datesfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, sugar, bread. 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.
More lemon pudding recipes
You might also like
Lemon Cake228 recipes
Bread Pudding153 recipes
Lemon Ice147 recipes
Lemon Sherbet103 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.