Why it works: Milk and butter match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 81,222 recipes mention both. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: egg, milk, tree nuts (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Prepare
Blanch the bitter and sweet almonds, then boil them in the milk for 20 minutes.
Pound the almonds to a paste.
Butter a mold and decorate the sides with dried cherries.
Make the mixture
When the milk is nearly cold, add the beaten eggs, thick cream, and brandy.
Mix in the crumbled sponge cake and beat the mixture for 10 minutes.
Stir in the sifted sugar.
Steam and serve
Pour the mixture into the mold, cover it with buttered writing paper, and steam over fast-boiling water for 1 hour and 45 minutes.
Serve with 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.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Milk + buttertop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together81,222 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Cream + buttertop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together41,494 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Almond + buttertop 5% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together9,198 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Cream + sugartop 5% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together43,437 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Brandy + buttertop 6% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together5,127 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture and set into a firm, sliceable custard when steamed.
- Almonds
- Provide the main nutty flavour and a fine, paste-like body to the pudding.
- Sponge cake
- Soaks up the liquid and gives the pudding a soft, tender crumb.
- Thick cream
- Adds richness and fat, giving a smoother, moister texture.
- Milk
- Provides the liquid base that carries the almond flavour into the custard.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and balances the bitterness of the almonds.
The step that matters
Steam over fast-boiling water for the full time. Eggs set gently under steam; if the water is not kept boiling, or the steaming is cut short, the custard stays wet and loose in the centre.
Flavor stand-ins for the almond
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, cream, brandy, sugar, butter):
- Almondthe original
- Pecansabout as good a flavor fit
- Filbertabout as good a flavor fit
- Cocoaabout as good a flavor fit
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, cream, brandy, sugar, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
“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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