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Dessert

Lemon Pudding

A baked lemon custard with macaroons, whipped egg whites, and nutmeg, topped with pistachios or almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Lemon 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

  1. Grease a pudding dish with butter.

  2. Place a border of puff pastry around the edge of the dish.

Make the batter

  1. Mix lemon juice, grated rind, cream, bruised macaroons, egg yolks, whipped egg whites, grated nutmeg, cinnamon, powdered sugar, and salt with a whisk for about 10 minutes.

  2. Pour the batter into the dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Sprinkle shredded pistachio kernels or almonds on top.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 30 minutes.

  3. Sprinkle sifted sugar over the pudding.

  4. Serve.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + pistachiotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together80 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Cinnamon + pistachiotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together201 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Lemon + pistachiotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together431 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Add richness and help the pudding set into a soft, custard-like texture.
Egg whites
Whipped, they add air and lightness to the batter as it bakes.
Cream
Adds fat and moisture, giving the pudding a smooth, tender texture.
Macaroons
Bruised crumbs add almond sweetness and body to the batter.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright flavour that balances the sugar.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and helps it brown lightly in the oven.

The step that matters

Whisking the batter with the whipped egg whites. Whipped egg whites hold air that gives lift. Whisking too hard or too long can deflate them, leaving a denser pudding. Fold gently once they are combined.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, egg, nutmeg, cinnamon, sugar, butter, pistachio):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, nutmeg, cinnamon, sugar, butter, pistachio. 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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