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Dessert

Sponge Batter Pudding

A steamed pudding made from milk, eggs, butter, flour, sugar, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Sponge Batter Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the custard

  1. Heat half the milk in a double boiler.

  2. Mix the other half of the milk with the flour to make a paste.

  3. When the milk in the boiler is scalding, stir in the paste until smooth.

  4. Cook for 4 minutes, then remove from heat and add butter, sugar, salt, and beaten yolks.

  5. Let the mixture cool slightly, then fold in the beaten egg whites.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter a pudding dish and pour the batter into it, filling it halfway.

  2. Place the dish in a large pan and add hot water to the pan until it reaches halfway up the sides of the dish.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 30-35 minutes.

  4. Serve immediately with hot cream sauce.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Eggs
Yolks enrich and help set the custard; whites folded in give the pudding its airy lift.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth base as its starch swells and gels when heated.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the batter, which sets into a soft, custardy texture.
Butter
Adds richness and a tender texture while carrying flavor through the pudding.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the pudding's surface brown lightly in the oven.

The step that matters

Fold in the egg whites after the mixture cools slightly. If the base is still very hot, the whites will cook and lose air too quickly, and the pudding will be dense. Fold gently so the trapped air stays in the batter and lifts it as it bakes.

“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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