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Dessert

Plain Rice Pudding

A simple rice pudding made by soaking rice in milk, adding sugar, butter, and vanilla or spices, then baking.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Plain Rice Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the rice

  1. Soak the rice in warm milk for two hours, keeping the milk warm in a water bath.

  2. Add salt and baking soda to the milk.

  3. Once the milk is absorbed, add the quart of milk.

Bake

  1. Transfer to a pudding dish and mix in sugar, melted butter, and vanilla or spices.

  2. Place the dish in a pan of hot water and bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven for two hours.

  3. Add more hot milk if the rice becomes dry.

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.

  1. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Rice + vanillatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,352 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Raw rice
Softens as it soaks and bakes, giving the pudding its body and bulk.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the rice absorbs and that sets into a creamy custard-like texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the top brown lightly during baking.
Melted butter
Adds fat, contributing richness and a smoother mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Adding more hot milk if the rice becomes dry. Rice keeps absorbing liquid as it bakes, so the pudding can dry out and turn stiff. Replacing lost liquid with hot milk keeps the texture creamy and the starch moist.

“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.

More rice pudding recipes

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