Skip to main content
Dessert

Corn Starch Pudding

A sweet pudding made with milk, corn starch, sugar, egg whites, salt, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Corn Starch Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pudding

  1. Mix corn starch, sugar, and salt in a bowl.

  2. Gradually add scalded milk while stirring constantly until the mixture thickens.

  3. Cook in a double boiler for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

  4. Fold in the beaten egg whites until well combined.

  5. Add vanilla and mix thoroughly.

Mold and serve

  1. Pour into a wet mold.

  2. Chill.

  3. Serve with cold sweet cream.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,943 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Corn starch
Thickens the milk into a smooth, sliceable pudding as it gelatinizes with heat.
Egg whites
Beaten whites add airy lightness and help the pudding set with a tender texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and contributes to its smooth body.
Scalded milk
Forms the liquid base that the starch thickens into a creamy custard.

The step that matters

Gradually add scalded milk while stirring constantly. Adding hot milk slowly while stirring keeps the starch dispersed, so it thickens evenly without lumps. Dumping it in at once lets starch clump before it can hydrate.

“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 cornstarch pudding recipes

Chocolate 13 See all 106 →

You might also like

Vanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesCorn CakeCorn Cake90 recipesCorn Starch CakeCorn Starch Cake89 recipesCorn CakesCorn Cakes22 recipes