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Baked Macaroni Pudding with Almonds

A baked dish of macaroni, milk, eggs, butter, sugar, nutmeg, and lemon peel.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Baked Macaroni Pudding with Almonds

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the macaroni

  1. Break the macaroni into small pieces and soak it.

  2. Simmer the macaroni in boiling water until tender.

Make the custard

  1. In a bowl, mix the eggs, butter, and sugar.

  2. Add the macaroni and milk to the mixture and beat well.

  3. Pour the mixture into a buttered dish.

Bake

  1. Grate nutmeg and lemon peel over the top.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for one hour.

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 + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,685 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the custard as they cook, giving the pudding its structure.
Macaroni
Forms the body of the pudding, absorbing the milk and custard as it bakes.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the eggs set in, keeping the pudding moist and creamy.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing to a tender texture.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the top brown lightly in the oven.

The step that matters

Beat the macaroni and milk into the egg mixture well. Thorough beating distributes the eggs, sugar and butter evenly so the custard sets smoothly rather than in streaks or curds through the pudding.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Parsleyfits less well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

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