Name: Corn Pudding
Ingredients: 12 ears tender, green uncooked corn, grated; 4 eggs, yolks and whites separated; 1 teaspoon sugar; 1 teaspoon flour; 1 tablespoon melted butter; pepper to taste; coarse sea salt to taste; 1 pint milk

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Corn 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.

Prepare the batter

Grate the corn and place it in a mixing bowl.
Add the beaten yolks and whites of the eggs to the corn.
Mix in the sugar, flour, melted butter, pepper, and salt.
Stir in the milk until well combined.

Bake

Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 45 minutes.

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.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,955 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,324 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,165 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Corn: Provides the bulk, sweetness and tender body of the pudding.
Eggs: Set during baking to bind the pudding into a custard-like texture.
Milk: Adds moisture and helps form a soft, creamy custard.
Butter: Adds richness and fat for a smoother, more tender crumb.
Flour: Thickens the custard slightly so it holds its shape when set.

The step that matters

Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 45 minutes.. Eggs set gradually as they heat. Baking too long or too hot can curdle and toughen the custard, leaving it dry and grainy, so check it for a set center rather than relying on time alone.

“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.