Skip to main content
Dessert

Batter Pudding

A simple boiled pudding made from egg, flour, milk, and salt, cooked in a butter‑greased cup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Batter Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Fill a saucepan halfway with warm water and bring the water to a boil.

  2. In a bowl, combine 2 teaspoons of flour and a few grains of salt, then break in 1 egg.

  3. Mix the egg with the flour, then gradually add ⅓ cup of milk.

  4. Stir the mixture vigorously with a wooden spoon.

  5. Let the batter stand for 30 minutes.

  6. Grease a cup well with butter, then stir the batter again and pour it into the greased cup.

Steam and serve

  1. Wring out a small cloth in boiling water and flour the cloth well.

  2. Tie the cloth over the top of the cup with string.

  3. Place the cup in the saucepan.

  4. Let it boil for 45 minutes.

  5. Remove the cloth from the cup.

  6. Serve the pudding as desired.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Egg
Binds the batter and sets with heat to give the pudding its firm, tender structure.
Flour
Provides starch and structure that thickens the batter as it cooks.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness, loosening the batter into a pourable mixture.
Butter
Greases the cup so the set pudding releases cleanly.

The step that matters

Tie the cloth over the cup and keep the pan boiling. The floured cloth and tight tie keep the batter sealed while it steams. If the water stops boiling, the pudding cooks unevenly and can turn heavy or doughy, since the egg and flour need steady heat to set.

“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.

More batter pudding recipes

Boiled 71Baked 53Apple 30Steamed 30Fruit 19Meat 9 See all 241 →

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes