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Dessert

Queen of Puddings

A baked pudding made with ladyfingers, milk, egg yolks, sugar, corn starch, and topped with meringue.

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 ↓

Queen of Puddings

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 base

  1. Line a pudding dish with ladyfingers or stale sponge cake.

  2. In a double boiler, heat the milk until it reaches a boiling point.

  3. Stir in the egg yolks, sugar, corn starch, and cook for 5 minutes.

  4. Pour the cream mixture over the cake and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

Top and finish

  1. Beat the egg whites with the powdered sugar until stiff peaks form.

  2. Spread the meringue over the top of the pudding and bake until golden brown.

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

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

  3. Corn + vanillatop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,943 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

Egg yolks
Thicken the milk custard and enrich its texture as they cook.
Egg whites
Whip into a stiff meringue that forms the light, browned topping.
Corn starch
Thickens the custard so it sets rather than staying runny.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard that soaks into the cake.
Lady fingers or stale sponge cake
Provides the absorbent base that holds the custard.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites to stiff peaks. Under-beaten whites collapse and weep, while over-beaten whites turn dry and grainy. Stiff, glossy peaks hold their shape and brown well in the oven.

“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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