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 ↓
Tapioca Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the tapioca
Wash the tapioca thoroughly and soak it in 1 quart of cold water overnight.
Drain the unabsorbed water from the tapioca.
Make the pudding
Beat together the sugar and melted butter.
Add the beaten egg yolks, milk, and tapioca.
Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.
Pour the mixture into a buttered dish.
Bake until set.
Serve
Serve warm with sugar and cream or a sweet vanilla-flavored sauce.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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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).
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
- Flake tapioca
- Starch that thickens the milk and gives the pudding its soft, set body as it bakes.
- Eggs
- Yolks enrich and thicken the custard, while whipped whites lighten the texture and help it rise.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the tapioca swells in and the eggs set into a custard.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps tenderize the custard.
- Melted butter
- Adds richness and fat, giving the pudding a smoother mouthfeel.
The step that matters
Fold in the beaten egg whites gently. Egg whites hold air from beating, which lightens the pudding. Vigorous stirring knocks that air out, leaving a denser result after baking.
“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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