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Dessert

Quaking Pudding

A custard-like pudding made with cream, wine, eggs, flour, nutmeg, and sugar, boiled in a cloth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Quaking Pudding

Why it works: Flour and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Quaking Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the custard

  1. Scald the cream and let it cool completely.

  2. Once cold, add the beaten eggs, flour, grated nutmeg, and sugar.

  3. Butter a dish and pour the mixture in.

Cook and serve

  1. Tie a floured cloth over the dish and boil for 1 hour.

  2. Carefully turn it out to avoid cracking.

  3. Serve with melted butter, wine, and sugar.

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.

  1. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
Set the custard into a firm, sliceable pudding as they cook.
Cream
Provides richness and a smooth, tender body to the pudding.
Flour
Thickens the custard so it holds its shape when turned out.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and balances the richness of the cream and eggs.

The step that matters

Turning it out carefully. The set custard is delicate and can crack if handled roughly. Letting it cool slightly and turning it gently keeps the surface intact, since the egg proteins firm as the pudding cools.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, wine, egg, flour, sugar):

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Cinnamonfits about as well
  3. Jalapenofits less well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, wine, egg, flour, sugar. 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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