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Puddings, Custards, Creams, Etc.

A steamed custard pudding made with layers of cake and fruit, topped with a lemon or vanilla flavored custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,053 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Puddings, Custards, Creams, Etc.

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mould

  1. Prepare a mould by lining it with a layer of cake, about 1 inch thick, covering the sides and bottom.

  2. Fill the mould with alternate layers of cake and fruit.

Make the custard

  1. In a bowl, mix the eggs and sugar, then add the milk and heat for 2-3 minutes.

  2. Pour in the lemon or vanilla extract and mix well.

  3. Pour the custard mixture into the mould.

Steam and cook

  1. Steam the pudding by placing it in a pan half full of water and set it in the oven.

  2. Cook for about 45 minutes.

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. Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  5. Egg + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together44,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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
Set when heated, giving the custard its firm, sliceable structure.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps soften the set custard's texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard and adds moisture for the eggs to set in.
Cake
Soaks up the custard as it sets, holding the pudding together in layers.
Fruit
Adds flavour and moisture between the layers of cake.

The step that matters

Steaming the pudding gently. Eggs set as they heat, and if the water bath boils hard or the heat is too high, the custard can become rough, watery or curdled. Keeping the heat gentle lets it set evenly.

Swap the lemon

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

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

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