Why it works: Sugar and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Prune Pudding
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 the prunes
Cook the prunes until very soft.
Remove the pits and break the prunes up well.
Make the pudding
Mix the prunes with sugar and the beaten egg whites in a bowl.
Pour the mixture into a baking dish.
Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 minutes.
Make the creamy sauce
Beat the egg yolks.
Add the hot water to the beaten yolks.
Cook the mixture in a double boiler until creamy.
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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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Prunes
- Provide the main fruit body, moisture and deep, sweet flavour once softened and broken up.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps balance the tartness of the cooked prunes.
- Egg whites
- Beaten whites trap air and set during baking, giving the pudding its light, firm structure.
- Egg yolks
- Thicken the custard sauce and add richness as they gently cook over heat.
The step that matters
Cooking the yolk mixture in the double boiler. Egg yolks thicken gently at low, indirect heat. If the mixture gets too hot or cooks too fast, the yolks can scramble and turn grainy instead of smooth and creamy.
“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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