Name: Sweetmeat Pudding
Ingredients: 1 ounce orange peel, thinly sliced; 1 ounce lemon peel, thinly sliced; 1 ounce citron, thinly sliced; puff pastry for lining the dish; 7 egg yolks; 2 egg whites; 5 ounces sugar

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 ↓

Sweetmeat Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Line a dish with puff pastry.
Place the sliced orange peel, lemon peel, and citron at the bottom of the dish.

Make and bake

In a bowl, mix the yolks of seven eggs with the whites of two eggs and add five ounces of sugar.
Pour the egg mixture over the sweetmeats.
Bake in the preheated oven for 35 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.

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.

Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,634 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together53,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Lemon + eggtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together44,316 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Orange + sugartop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together19,212 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together122,807 recipes

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

Lemon and sugar 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

Egg yolks: Thicken the filling as they set, giving a rich, custard-like texture.
Egg whites: Add structure and lightness to the egg mixture as it bakes.
Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps balance the tartness of the citrus peel.
Orange peel: Adds bright, aromatic citrus flavour and a slight bitterness.
Lemon peel: Adds sharp citrus aroma and acidity to the filling.
Citron: Contributes candied-fruit flavour and aromatic bitterness to the pudding.