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Custard Puddings

A simple custard made with egg, sugar, milk, and optional flavouring, steamed in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Custard Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the custard

  1. Beat the egg slightly.

  2. Add the sugar and milk.

  3. Let the mixture stand until the sugar dissolves.

  4. Strain the mixture.

Steam

  1. Butter a large cup or small bowl and pour the custard into it.

  2. Cover the top with a piece of buttered paper.

  3. Place the cup in a saucepan of boiling water, ensuring the water comes halfway up the cup.

  4. Move the saucepan to the side of the heat.

  5. Let the custard steam for about 20 minutes until firm.

  6. Do not let the water boil while the custard is steaming to avoid holes.

Serve

  1. Serve hot or cold, either turned out or in the cup.

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. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Eggs
Egg proteins coagulate on gentle heat, setting the custard into a firm, sliceable body.
Milk
Provides the liquid base and moisture that the egg proteins set into a tender custard.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and helps it dissolve evenly into the milk before cooking.

The step that matters

Keep the steaming water below a boil. Boiling water heats the custard too fast, so the egg proteins over-set and form bubbles and holes. Gentle steam sets it evenly and smoothly.

“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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