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Dessert

Eclair Pudding

A baked pudding made with eggs, sugar, flour, vanilla, baking powder, milk, grated chocolate, and custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and milk 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 ↓

Eclair 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 cake

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

  2. Beat the eggs and sugar until light and fluffy.

  3. Add the flour, vanilla extract, and baking powder; mix until smooth.

  4. Pour the batter into a greased baking dish.

  5. Bake the batter until golden.

Make the chocolate mixture

  1. Combine the egg white, milk, sugar, and grated chocolate in a saucepan.

  2. Boil the mixture until thick and smooth.

Make the custard

  1. Heat the milk with a pinch of salt.

  2. Whisk the egg yolks, sugar, and cornstarch until combined.

  3. Gradually add the hot milk to the egg mixture, stirring constantly.

  4. Return the mixture to the saucepan.

  5. Cook the mixture until thickened.

  6. Flavor the custard with vanilla and lemon.

Assemble

  1. Split the baked pudding.

  2. Fill the split portions with custard.

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. Vanilla + milktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

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

  2. Vanilla + chocolatetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Flour + vanillatop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 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

Eggs
Whipped with sugar to trap air, giving the baked batter its light, airy structure.
Flour
Provides the starch and structure that sets the batter as it bakes.
Baking powder
Releases gas during baking, helping the batter rise and become light.
Milk
Adds moisture and liquid so the custard can thicken smoothly with heat.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they heat and add richness and colour.
Cornstarch
Thickens the custard by swelling with heat, giving it a smooth, firm body.

The step that matters

Gradually add the hot milk to the egg mixture, stirring constantly. Adding hot liquid too fast or without stirring can scramble the egg yolks, leaving lumps. Adding it slowly while stirring tempers the yolks so the custard stays smooth.

Swap the lemon

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, flour, vanilla, milk, chocolate. 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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