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 ↓
Tapioca Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the tapioca
Soak the tapioca in cold water for 2 hours until it absorbs all the water.
Warm the milk in a saucepan until scalding, then stir in the tapioca off the heat.
Let the mixture cool slightly, then beat for 1 minute.
Make the custard base
Cream the sugar with the butter, then mix in the beaten egg yolks.
Combine the mixtures and gently fold in the stiffly beaten egg whites.
Bake and serve
Pour into a buttered dish and bake covered at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes, then uncover to brown lightly.
Serve hot with wine, lemon, or brandy sauce.
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.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar 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
- Egg whites
- Whipped into the mixture to lighten it and help the pudding rise and set with a soft texture.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich the custard with fat and help it set smoothly as it bakes.
- Pearl tapioca
- Thickens the milk as its starch swells, giving the pudding its body.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the tapioca swells in and sets into a creamy custard.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the pudding brown lightly on top.
The step that matters
Folding in the egg whites. Stiffly beaten whites hold air that lifts the custard. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring or deflating them makes the pudding dense and flat.
“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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