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Dessert

Cherry Pudding

A dessert made with tapioca, cherries, and optional cream, baked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Cherry Pudding

Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Cherry Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the tapioca

  1. Soak the tapioca in water until transparent.

  2. Cook the soaked tapioca in 1 pint of water until transparent.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a pudding dish, place the fresh pitted cherries and sprinkle with sugar.

  2. Pour the cooked tapioca over the cherries.

  3. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve with or without cream.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Tapioca
Thickens the cooking liquid into a clear, soft pudding as its starch gelatinizes.
Fresh pitted cherries
Provide the fruit flavor and juices that moisten and flavor the pudding.
Sugar
Sweetens the dish and draws out cherry juice during baking.

The step that matters

Cooking the soaked tapioca until transparent. Tapioca starch must be fully gelatinized to thicken properly; undercooked pearls stay opaque, chalky and firm. Cooking until clear shows the starch has swollen and set the texture.

“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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