Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Lemon Cheese Cake Pupding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Remove the rind from the lemons and boil until soft.
Beat the boiled lemons into the sugar.
In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and mix in the butter, lemon mixture, and flour.
Line a pie plate with the pie crust and bake it at 400°F (200°C).
Make the custard
In a saucepan, combine 3 beaten egg yolks, 1 cup sugar, lemon juice, grated peel of 1 lemon, and 1 tablespoon butter.
Cook for 6 minutes, stirring constantly.
Remove from heat and fold in the beaten egg whites.
Bake
Pour the mixture over the baked crust and bake for a few more minutes.
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.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
-
Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,227 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together30,404 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 yolks
- Provide richness and help thicken the filling as they set with heat.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps give the filling a smooth, soft body.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and a tender, smooth texture.
- Flour
- Adds body and helps the filling hold its structure as it bakes.
- Lemons
- Provide acidity and bright lemon aroma that balances the sweetness.
The step that matters
Stir constantly while cooking the custard. Egg yolks thicken gently with steady stirring; if heated unevenly or left unstirred, they can scramble or curdle, leaving a grainy texture.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, egg, butter, flour):
- Raisinfits better
- Vanillafits better
- Figfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, egg, butter, flour. 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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