Why it works: Orange and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓
Bakbd Marrow Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Butter a pie or tart dish.
Layer the sponge biscuits, marrow, and diced peels alternately in the dish.
In a bowl, beat the 3 egg yolks and add the cream, milk, and pounded sugar to taste.
Pour the mixture over the layered ingredients.
Roll out the pastry and cover the dish.
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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Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together10,634 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Biscuit + nutmegtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together368 recipes
Shared aroma: maltol (caramel, sweet).
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Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together11,318 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Orange + nutmegtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,746 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (biscuit, orange, lemon, nutmeg, butter, egg, cream):
- Vanillafits better
- Limefits better
- Blueberryfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, orange, lemon, nutmeg, butter, egg, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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