Why it works: Rice and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,374 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Rice Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Make the pudding
Combine rice, milk, and salt in a farina kettle and boil for 1¼ hours.
Beat sugar and egg yolks together in a bowl.
Pour the boiling rice mixture over the egg yolk mixture, stirring well with a fork.
Top and brown
Once cooled, make a meringue with the egg whites and spread it over the top of the pudding.
Brown the meringue in a preheated oven.
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.
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Rice + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,374 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Sugar + eggtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Rice + sugartop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together8,744 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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
- Rice
- Cooks into soft grains that thicken the milk and give the pudding its body.
- Milk
- Forms the creamy liquid base that the rice cooks in and sets around.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich and thicken the pudding, adding richness and a smooth set.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps tenderize the custard texture.
- Egg whites
- Whip into a meringue that forms a light, sweet topping which browns in the oven.
The step that matters
Stirring the boiling rice into the egg yolks. Adding hot liquid to yolks too quickly can scramble them into lumps. Pouring slowly while stirring well gently warms the yolks so they blend smoothly into the pudding.
“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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