Skip to main content
Dessert

Rice Pudding, Ground

A sweet pudding made from ground rice, milk, suet, sugar, eggs, and optional brandy, baked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Rice and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Rice Pudding, Ground

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the custard base

  1. Beat the ground rice gradually with ½ pint of milk until smooth.

  2. Pour 1 pint of boiling milk over the mixture and boil for 15 minutes, stirring constantly.

  3. When nearly cool, stir in the suet (or butter), sugar, nutmeg or lemon rind, and beaten eggs. If desired, add brandy.

Bake

  1. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered dish.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 45 minutes to 1 hour.

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. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  2. Rice + nutmegtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Rice + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,265 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Milk + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  5. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Ground rice
Thickens the milk as it boils, giving the pudding its body and soft texture.
Eggs
Set during baking to bind the pudding and give it a firm, custard-like structure.
Milk
Provides the liquid base that the ground rice swells in and the eggs set within.
Suet or butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, tender mouthfeel.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps brown its surface during baking.

The step that matters

Boil the rice and milk while stirring constantly. Ground rice settles and scorches on the bottom of a pan if left unstirred. Constant stirring keeps it smooth and lets the starch swell evenly, so the base thickens without lumps or burnt flavor.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, beef, sugar, egg, brandy):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, beef, sugar, egg, brandy. 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.

You might also like

Rice CakeRice Cake120 recipesBrandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesRice CreamRice Cream43 recipesRice JellyRice Jelly42 recipes