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Dessert

Peach Pudding

A soft dough filled with peaches, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Peach Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dough

  1. In a bowl, combine the egg, milk, melted butter, and baking powder.

  2. Gradually add flour until a very soft dough forms.

Assemble, bake and serve

  1. Shape the dough with your hands and cover the fruit with it.

  2. Place a piece of paper over the dough and bake until golden.

  3. Serve with cream or sauce.

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

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

  2. Milk + peachtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together781 recipes

    Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + peachtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together860 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Egg
Binds the dough and adds structure as it sets.
Milk
Adds moisture so the dough stays soft while baking.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender crumb.
Baking powder
Releases gas that makes the dough rise.
Flour
Forms the dough's structure as it bakes.
Peaches
Supply fruit flavour and juices that moisten the dough as it bakes.

The step that matters

Gradually add flour until a very soft dough forms. Adding flour gradually and stopping at a very soft dough keeps the pudding light. Too much flour, or overworking the dough, develops more gluten and gives a dense, tough result.

Swap the peach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, milk, butter, flour):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, butter, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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