Skip to main content
Dessert

A French Rice Pudding, or Gateau De Riz

A French rice pudding made with milk, rice, butter, sugar, lemon rind, eggs, and baked with bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

A French Rice Pudding, or Gateau De Riz

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the rice base

  1. Gently heat the milk (or milk and cream) in a pot.

  2. Add the washed and drained rice.

  3. Cook until the rice is tender.

  4. Stir in the butter, sugar, salt, and lemon rind.

  5. Simmer until the rice is fully swollen.

  6. Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

  7. Gradually stir in the egg yolks until well combined.

Prepare the pan

  1. Coat a small copper stewpan with clarified butter.

  2. Sprinkle the stewpan with stale bread crumbs.

Fold and bake

  1. Whisk the egg whites until stiff.

  2. Gently fold the egg whites into the rice mixture.

  3. Pour the mixture into the prepared stewpan without disturbing the crumbs.

  4. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) for 1 hour until browned and firm.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

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

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

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Carolina rice
Forms the body of the pudding as its starch swells and softens in the milk.
Egg yolks
Enrich the custard and help set the pudding as they cook.
Whites of 6 eggs
Whisked to stiffness, they add lightness and help the pudding rise in the oven.
New milk
Provides the liquid that the rice absorbs and cooks in, giving a creamy texture.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the pudding and adds softness to the finished texture.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and a smooth, tender mouthfeel to the rice.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Whites hold air only when whisked to stiffness, and overmixing or stirring them in vigorously knocks that air out. Folding gently keeps the pudding light and helping it rise.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

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

You might also like

Lemon Rice PuddingLemon Rice Pudding19 recipesLemon CakeLemon Cake228 recipesBread PuddingBread Pudding153 recipesLemon IceLemon Ice147 recipes