Why it works: Vanilla and peach match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 558 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Peach 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.
Cook the rice
Rinse the rice and place it in a saucepan with enough cold water to cover it.
Set the saucepan in a larger pan of boiling water and cook the rice for 30 minutes.
Remove from heat and fluff the rice with a fork to separate the grains.
Make the custard
In another saucepan, combine the milk and sugar, and heat over boiling water.
Beat the egg yolks with a spoonful of cold milk, then stir into the hot milk until it thickens, but do not let it boil.
Remove from heat, add the butter and vanilla, and let cool for 5 minutes.
Beat the egg whites with 1 tablespoon of sugar until stiff, then fold them into the cooled mixture.
Gently fold in the cooked rice.
Assemble and bake
In a pudding pan, layer the rice custard and canned peaches until all ingredients are used, finishing with the rice custard on top.
Place the pudding pan in a larger iron pan filled with a little boiling water and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 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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Vanilla + peachtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together558 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,187 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
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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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Rice + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,374 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together35,032 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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
- Rice
- Starch that thickens into the body of the pudding as it cooks in the custard.
- Eggs
- Yolks thicken the custard and whites, whipped, lighten the pudding and help it set.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base of the custard and supplies creaminess.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps the whipped egg whites hold their stiff structure.
- Butter
- Adds fat for a rich, smooth texture in the custard.
- Canned peaches
- Add fruity sweetness and moisture between the custard layers.
The step that matters
Thickening the egg yolks into the milk. Egg yolks set at about 160°F, so heating too fast or letting the custard boil can curdle or scramble the eggs and leave a grainy texture. Stir constantly and keep the heat gentle until it coats a spoon.
Swap the peach
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, sugar, butter, egg, vanilla):
- Coconutfits better
- Figfits about as well
- Peachthe original
- Blueberryfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, sugar, butter, egg, vanilla. 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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