Name: Cherry Pudding
Ingredients: 1 cup sugar; 1 cup milk; 1 egg; 2 tablespoons melted butter; 2 teaspoons baking powder; Flour to make a moderately stiff batter; 1 cup stewed cherries, drained

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 ↓

Cherry Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

In a bowl, mix sugar, milk, egg, melted butter, and baking powder.
Add enough flour to create a moderately stiff batter.
Fold in the stewed cherries.

Steam and serve

Pour the mixture into cups and steam until cooked through.
For the sauce, use the juice from the cherries.

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.

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.

Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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: Binds the batter and helps give the pudding its structure as it cooks.
Baking powder: Releases gas during cooking, helping the pudding rise and turn light.
Butter: Adds richness and a tender texture to the batter.
Flour: Forms the batter's structure, setting as the pudding steams.
Cherries: Add fruit flavor, sweetness and moisture to the pudding.

“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.