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Dessert

Lemon Rice Pudding

A custard-like pudding made from milk, rice, sugar, eggs, and lemon, topped with meringue.

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

Why it works: Milk and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Lemon Rice 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 pudding

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, combine the milk, rice, 1 cup of sugar, beaten egg yolks, and grated lemon rind.

  3. Pour the mixture into a baking dish and bake for 30 minutes or until the custard is set.

Make the meringue and finish

  1. For the meringue, beat the egg whites until stiff, then gradually add the remaining ½ cup of sugar and lemon juice.

  2. Spread the meringue over the pudding and return to the oven to brown lightly.

  3. Serve hot or cold.

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. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  2. Rice + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,366 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  3. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

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

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Milk
Provides liquid and creaminess that forms the body of the custard.
Rice
Adds bulk and a soft, tender texture to the baked pudding.
Eggs
Egg yolks set the custard, while whites whip into the meringue for structure.
Sugar
Sweetens the pudding and helps the meringue become glossy and stable.
Lemon
Rind and juice add bright aroma and acidity to the custard and topping.

The step that matters

Browning the meringue. Egg whites whipped with sugar can weep or collapse if overbaked or if sugar is not fully dissolved. Watch closely so the topping browns lightly without drying out.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar, rice, egg. 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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